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How Google keeps employees by treating them like kids (2006)

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Re: How Google keeps employees by treating them like kids (2006)

#131

Post by rodgerd »

wpietri wrote: post #104
michaelt wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does your assessment of the value of advertising include the things that are funded by adverts? That covers almost all print journalism, a lot of full-time internet content creators (from the onion to full time youtube content creators) not to mention Google Search, Gmail, Google Maps, Chrome and Youtube. If advertising includes everything paid for by adverts, advertising is useful to humanity. If advertising doesn't…

We happen to currently fund some things via ads. But that's an accident of history. If we didn't have ads, there's no reason to think we wouldn't have found another way.

There are rather a lot of industries that are all ears for yor alternatives.

Re: How Google keeps employees by treating them like kids (2006)

#133

Post by asveikau »

amaks wrote: post #14
ex-googler1 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Apparently you haven't worked for Microsoft. Google is engineer's heaven compared to MS.

I worked at Microsoft and I was unhappy with a lot of the issues people talk about.

I knew a few people internally who talked about Google like they did a better job at company culture, at engineering, at management. Maybe I bought into that myth a little myself, too.

What I've come to realize with some time away from MS and having talked to Googlers is that Microsoft and Google are essentially the same beast. From what I've heard all the worst complaints I had about MS culture also exist at Google.

For now, Google has an edge because their peak coolness is more recent than Microsoft's. I'm reminded of stories from folks who worked at MS in '99 or something like that, when it was still very much a big company but much more pleasant to be at. Maybe Google in 2013 is like Microsoft in 2003. In this theory, the "great place to work" factor is still there, but past its peak, declining, and will decline further, to the point where they eventually get to where Microsoft is today on this trajectory.

Personally I think that too many people at MS are obsessed with competing with Google, and making such comparisons, to the point that they are blinded to the idea that Google can be viewed as the old thing.

Re: How Google keeps employees by treating them like kids (2006)

#134

Post by madaxe_again »

luu wrote: post #15

Funny, my experience is the opposite on literally every concrete assertion about people and motivations. Looking at my team, and the broader team under my director, only one was hired "straight out of college". Well, if you consider fresh PhDs to be "straight out of college", there are a few, but I doubt Aaron meant folks approaching 30 with kids on the horizon when he was talking about people just out of college. Pe…

I'm personally aware of a very incapable 22 year old, fresh graduate, who has been hired for north of $200k.

I'm also aware of a whole bunch of other folks who have been variously hired within months of graduation, so I'd wager there's some selection bias from your corner too.

Re: How Google keeps employees by treating them like kids (2006)

#135

Post by madaxe_again »

yuhong wrote: post #71
jsmthrowaway wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I work on Google Fiber. You give us money, we give you an Internet connection. ...so that there's a pretty good chance that [you] will use Google Search, and [we] will then show you ads. Also, [we] inadvertently created a channel for analysis on [your] Web browsing habits if [we] were so inclined, which would enable [us] to refine advertising even more, among other things. If those are not the entire rationale for…

The ads are not bad by themselves.

It's all ads. "Organic" search is ads. The majority of online businesses are absolutely, totally, dependent on google's free ads(organic). Cf. rap genius.

... and the moment you start manually tweaking rankings... You can't possibly claim that you're not managing marketing.

Re: How Google keeps employees by treating them like kids (2006)

#136

Post by enneff »

Working at Google I feel the opposite of infantilised. I am given nearly total autonomy to do my job how I see fit (and shouldn't i? Nobody knows my job better than me). I can book business travel, order essential equipment, and even start new work spontaneously without wasting time seeking approval. I set my own goals and am the judged by how well I meet them.

I feel that traditional offices are more infantlilising in that they assume most workers need explicit instructions to get their work done and must seek approval to do anything out of the ordinary.

Aaron here is distracted by the shiny things. As an employee you very quickly become accustomed to the benefits and spend more time just getting work done.

Re: How Google keeps employees by treating them like kids (2006)

#137

Post by praptak »

sliverstorm wrote: post #50
hawkharris wrote: post #13

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. :)

Still a fridge always full of good food is a perk that's comparably hard to get by oneself. There's still the question whether it is desirable (getting fat is a real problem) but the point remains: some perks can be much more effectively provided by the employer.

On the other hand I hate all kinds of the mandatory fun activities at work. These work as antiperks for me.

Re: How Google keeps employees by treating them like kids (2006)

#138

Post by Symmetry »

tikhonj wrote: post #27
derwiki wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm surprised at how polarizing no offices vs open offices is. My first job at IBM, I had an office with two co-workers. They were great, but on days they were out it was sooo isolating. When I quit and took a job at a start up in SF with an open office plan, I loved it immediately. I could look across the room and see if the systems guy was there or getting coffee, instead of pinging into the Sametime void. So, I'm…

This is something I've found very weird: there's a sharp difference between the opinions of people I know in person and people online. HN commenters love to hate open office plans. It's one of the few topics on which they agree with /r/programming! And yet everywhere I've spent time has been in favor of open offices. This includes a few startups, sure, but also an enterprise software company (Guidewire), an academic…

My favorite and least favorite office environments were both open plan, it's all about how tightly you're packed in together, and whether there are side offices for private conversations or phone calls.

Re: How Google keeps employees by treating them like kids (2006)

#139

Post by swift »

absconditus wrote: post #121
shmerl wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This one doesn't look gray: http://www.businessinsider.com/inside-mozillas-amazing-offic...

The building appears to be better than average, but the workspaces look pretty horrible.

They're actually pretty good. Sit/stand electric desks all around, and lots of great spaces throughout the building if you get tired of your desk and want a change of pace. I was spoiled in previous jobs by having my own office, but short of that I think Mozilla SF is about as good as it gets.

Re: How Google keeps employees by treating them like kids (2006)

#140

Post by coldtea »

cromwellian wrote: post #98
alvarosm wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're comfortable in the Matrix, good for you. Just don't evangelize please.

Stating facts to correct erroneous claims isn't evangelization. What is the moral of this story anyway? That your workplace shouldn't offer you free food, or have fun areas with cool statues, because a replica of SpaceShip One will "infantilize you"? And this is supposed to scare people into going to a "grown up" workplace and grey suits and expensive shitty food? I used to pay high prices to eat lunch at IBM Cafeter…

>I used to pay high prices to eat lunch at IBM Cafeterias, and it was terrible food. But this infantilized me less?

Well, obviously yes. At least you knew you were in a employee -employer relation, not a "nice person giving you nice food" relation.

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