51–60 of 171 posts
Simply not true in 2013. They are aggressively hiring engineers of all sorts. College degrees are less relevant. Google, of all companies, have developed some of the finest talent recognition software in the valley.
I did a whois lookup out of curiosity, but the contact information all refers to contactprivacy.com, which is apparently set up to allow people to register domains privately.
I don't think this is really accurate. It's not about treating people like kids, it's about rejecting the attitude found at dilbert-style corporations. The T-Rex skeleton and the shark fins are there because they're cool. Google has monorail cars as meeting rooms in the Sydney office [1] - because an engineer requested it. It shows that management listens to employees. It gives people the confidence to propose somewh…
The article is from 2006. Things evolve.
Right after college, I was enticed by these perks: free food, laundry services, etc. After a few years in industry, I became more interested in the less sexy but more substantive benefits like a competitive salary, a 401K and good medical coverage. College-like perks and grown-up perks are not always mutually exclusive. My understanding is that Google pays developers well and offers great benefits. However, my experi…
"Stock options? Who needs stock options when you have beanbag chairs?" If I want a beanbag chair at my desk, I'll buy myself a beanbag chair, thankyouverymuch. :)
I had two run-ins with Google HR. Once after they purchased a company that had a product that I was a primary architect and programmer for. Part of the reason the process staled was because I explained "I consider programming like hammering nails. I program. I am not a programmer". I found their questions on what languages I program with to be silly. The other reason it staled had to do with their inability to discuss practical "projects" we could "work on together". It's as if Google is an Amish parent wanting to offer you their daughter in marriage with you committing before even getting a decent look at her.
To their credit the words "projects" and "work on together" coming from a potential hire are foreign to all companies. But if Google wants to avoid becoming Xerox in 30 years they would do well to understand this language and hire more like Al Qaeda rather than Ikea.
Developing a more network based structure is not that difficult to envision. For starters get rid of "%20 time", it's a joke. Instead I could imagine something more like: %25 on mandated work, %25 on google projects (what used to be %20 time), %50 time on projects entirely of your choosing that would be handled like an investment (with yearly reviews of direction as a board of a company would) and finally abolishment of most vacation days with vacation taken at will from the %50 and in any form (clustered, by day, half days, whatever). Full time creativity is a form of cognitive dissidence fostered only by industrial era thinking. Creative workers should be given the option to take minor or major pay cuts dynamically and at will in order to replenish their energy. Whereas today, asking for extra time off, even with a cut in pay, carries a lot of guilt for most. Such a structure as described, when monitored, also provides valuable feedback on the health of the employee and company. When you get something like this Google, hit me up on Pond.
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not much. i quit a few months ago and so happy to be out of that insane place. they compare your work against your coworkers, so its constant competition, even if you meet your "goals". they also have zero work/life balance. all that free food and google shuttles wear off after a couple of months. then their non-stop work life settles in and you realize you made a horrible decision by accepting the job offer. the onl…
Try MS, that's where the real competition is :-) I've heard horror stories about how someone on the team simply has to get low performance score, and when you get a low score it's basically a signal that you're getting fired. I can't imagine how poisonous that must be.
http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/12/5094864/microsoft-kills-s...
But yeah, a pretty bad system in principle.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Try MS, that's where the real competition is :-) I've heard horror stories about how someone on the team simply has to get low performance score, and when you get a low score it's basically a signal that you're getting fired. I can't imagine how poisonous that must be.
MS ended stack ranking over a month ago: http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/12/5094864/microsoft-kills-s... But yeah, a pretty bad system in principle.
Hey, did you also here that there are NO trees on their campus?
I guess on some level this is true. Is there some place where you can work and get money for doing whatever you want, and defying authority whenever you want? If so, sign me up! Over in the real world, working for an employer like Google is a risk hedge. If your idea for a project this quarter turns out to not be useful, you don't run out of money and end up living in a cardboard box. You learn from your experience,…
Ah, you must be one of the stars getting people to click on ads, even more. No matter how you spin it, you make money by what can rightfully be characterized as fraud (1,2,3), or confusing ads with unbiased content(if there's still a thing like unbiased content at Google) while ripping your users off. But whatever makes you feel better
1. http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2013/12/18/for-google-it-pays-to... 2. http://www.seobook.com/consumer-ad-awareness-search-results 3. http://www.afr.com/p/technology/google_top_product_search_re...