Earlier quoted context omitted.
Company I work for did this. Our CFO said he never wants to deal with real estate again. I will follow this man to the depths of hell and back.
(virtually)
Video call into the depths of hell
Google cuts office space in Bay Area by more than a million square feet
101–110 of 205 posts
Re: Google cuts office space in Bay Area by more than a million square feet
#102Re: Google cuts office space in Bay Area by more than a million square feet
#103Earlier quoted context omitted.
> on top of the worst way of working which is in-office. It's funny how both sides of this debate present their opinions as fact
It _is_ objectively true that WFH is better for the environment. But oh well, so far wildfires are contained to just wildfire season, so not a big deal :))))))
> But oh well, so far wildfires are contained to just wildfire season, so not a big deal
We just added a month and a half to wildfire season, just to keep that true!
Re: Google cuts office space in Bay Area by more than a million square feet
#104Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The inability to tap on someone's shoulder reduces group productivity, regardless of what those who don't want to be interrupted think. If you know a person does not like being interrupted don't be selfish and write a message. Why does your productivity matter more than mine?
Because 10 minutes of your time might save hours of someone else’s. Why is your productivity more important than your entire teams? I feel like people don’t treat achieving business goals as part of their job in dev. I’ve never had people treat this as a problem across other job roles.
If ten minutes of my time is worth hours of yours and you are coming to me, I must know what I'm doing and you ought to respect my concentration. You will still get your help, but respectful of my schedule. Tell me how urgently you need an answer, and I will triage it. If there is an incident, that is different.
I do believe that there is room for better tools in this area, and I'm working on it. Tools that help users solve their problems collaboratively without imposing undue burden on their coworkers.
Re: Google cuts office space in Bay Area by more than a million square feet
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
Have you considered that maybe your priors are just wrong? I don't know a single person who prefers in-office work who thinks that remote is more effective, but I know many who have the opposite opinion but prefer the flexibility. Maybe there isn't a realistic way to make remote as productive. I'm honest enough to say that the social pressure that people bemoan makes me significantly more productive. I wish it didn't…
> The inability to tap on someone's shoulder reduces group productivity, regardless of what those who don't want to be interrupted think. If you know a person does not like being interrupted don't be selfish and write a message. Why does your productivity matter more than mine?
In my experience working with people who didn't like to help people or people who helped people whenever they felt like it, they became managers or already were managers (because of course you can be super productive when you only help people when you feel like it) and then had revolts of people they managed when everyone got sick of having to waste hours because the other person didn't want to give a few minutes. People showing up late, missed deadlines, and just a general not caring about the company after so much disrespect. If you don't care about the company and just your career, you can continue to be hated and selfish, but it will come back to you if you ever start a company or want to advance past that level.
I was a naive intern at my first paid software gig, so I towed the line, but I watched as a startup went from hiring some very smart people to the engineers realizing they could come in at 11 hungover and leave at 4 because they were all smart, management was treating them like crap and they couldn't just fire everyone. There were other issues, but power tripping over personal productivity and not giving engineers time for help or questions about the business was a huge issue at that job.
This is not a promotion of the anti-WFH control busy body managers, but just know if your coworkers are asking you questions so they can do their job you should be mentoring them so they need to ask less questions. If you're the type to answer a slack message hours later, people are slowly growing to hate you and will eventually sabotage you.
Re: Google cuts office space in Bay Area by more than a million square feet
#106Earlier quoted context omitted.
my guess is that they planed to grow previously, and built/leased bunch of offices, but growth didn't happen, and they cut many jobs, so now they shrink office space.
Honestly depending on the time scales you look at, this could be seen as "growing office space less quickly". They just built a massive campus in ATL and have two more coming up in MTV and CHI.
They will be canceling them much like London regardless of how far along they are.
Re: Google cuts office space in Bay Area by more than a million square feet
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
Teams are more distributed now. Seattle and LA footprint will grow, bay area will shrink.
Will high level technical/product roles ever settle in SEA/LAX?
This is the profile. Mountain View was becoming an executive Versailles and the rest of the offices for the peons.
Re: Google cuts office space in Bay Area by more than a million square feet
#108Earlier quoted context omitted.
Google management has always been incompetent. It's just that now that economic conditions have forced them to make more drastic decisions that their incompetence is even more obvious.
Eric Schmidt seemed very competent, given how much of the famed old Google culture was built during his tenure. I was at Google during the Larry Page era and contrasting him with Schmidt was not favorable.
All the early Eng VPs were also great
Re: Google cuts office space in Bay Area by more than a million square feet
#109Earlier quoted context omitted.
TBF it's "two people share a desk on alternate days", and as the other commenter said, only in limited areas for now. How anyone thought that was a good idea, I have no idea.
If I am doing "2 days in office, 3 remote" for my employees, why would I want to pay twice as much so desks can sit vacant more than half the time?
Which also makes one wonder why the 2 days in office are even needed.
Re: Google cuts office space in Bay Area by more than a million square feet
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
Compare average programmer's salary Chicago vs. Mountain View...
A big company like a FAANG will shift the local market when they open an office. There are plenty of competent people all over the world that can’t move easily for whatever reason - usually family.
Yeah, it's a more generous explanation that they want to tap into the Chicago area talent pool. It's possibly true, a new office like this was no doubt planned years ago.