Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#231

Post by esotericn » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 3:00 PM UTC

slibhb wrote: post #93

itg wrote: post #24

Another "leader" who complains about employees wanting work life balance and they are extremely entitled. These are the type of managers you want to avoid. I'm sure many Googlers are happy you left.

If they really complained about not getting compensated for buying their own food during lockdown I think "entitled" is a fair descriptor. This is the first time I've read one of these blogs where the author complains about it being "practically impossible to fire someone". To me, that adds an air of authenticity to the complaining. In my experience too, the inability to fire people for reasons other than "this perso…

My employer has killed off office perks during lockdown; it doesn't seem intentional, more of a bureaucratic thing. People are still in the office, but the management aren't, so things don't get done.

I've told them that this is an issue for morale - the old "buying the cheap toilet paper" adage comes to mind - but I'm not holding out much hope that anything will happen.

Is it a significant hardship for me to buy lunch? No. It wouldn't be a significant hardship for them to give it either.

To be brutally honest - we all need _more_ support during lockdown and restrictions, not less. In the UK, work and the supermarket are pretty much the only legal reasons for most to be outside at the moment.

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#232

Post by a_c_s » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 3:00 PM UTC

tester34 wrote: post #155

willcipriano wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Try managing a team where people take last minute personal days all the time, without having to give advance notice or a reason. Try getting a job where they advertise a benefit, then complain when you use it.

Never heard of benefit called "taking free days last min is no problem"

That's what "personal days" are for.

Vacation days are days that are long planned.

Sick days are last-minute days for when you are ill.

Personal days are last-minute days for when, say, a pipe breaks in your apartment and you have to spend the day dealing with the mess. Or any other non-medical reason you have to be a person and not an employee for a day.

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#233

Post by matwood » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 3:01 PM UTC

gambiting wrote: post #184

slibhb wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they really complained about not getting compensated for buying their own food during lockdown I think "entitled" is a fair descriptor. This is the first time I've read one of these blogs where the author complains about it being "practically impossible to fire someone". To me, that adds an air of authenticity to the complaining. In my experience too, the inability to fire people for reasons other than "this perso…

>>If they really complained about not getting compensated for buying their own food during lockdown I think "entitled" is a fair descriptor. I very much disagree. If you were getting food at work previously, as in - it was clearly your agreed part of compensation - then I would absolutely complain if suddenly I had to buy my own. >> But the flipside of that is that, when there's a deadline, I'm very invested in meeti…

> But the second your manager walks in and says "john, I expect you to work this weekend" I'd start looking for a different job.

It's definitely a failure of management, but if John was playing games all week and now is being asked to work this weekend to finish, that's also on John. His manager should have stopped the all week playing, but people want to be treated like adults and be given personal responsibility, etc...

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#234

Post by ramraj07 » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 3:01 PM UTC

madeofpalk wrote: post #132

ramraj07 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A different way of putting it would be whether an employee takes personal responsibility towards their work. It's not incongruent with a balanced life. To me It just means occasdinally you might stay late at work, once in awhile an interesting problem gets you working on the company laptop all Saturday, and if something breaks you're not able to log off until you fix it. Doesn't mean you cant take Friday's off of or…

> once in awhile an interesting problem gets you working on the company laptop all Saturday, I will never do this. I havent done this since I was very very young at my first job and i didn't know better. I couldn't think of anything sader or more depressing that giving away my own personal time for someone else. I'm not going to work on the weekend. I've got much better things to do, like play video games or literall…

It's perfectly okay that you choose your values that way but it sounds very judgemental to think that's the only way to live. I won't work in a place where I'm not at least proud of what I'm doing. If that's true then whether the company makes money from it is only peripheral to me doing more than what I'm paid for - I genuinely like and enjoy what I do, I like to code and often the most interesting coding problem before me (with the most resources at my disposal by a longshot) is my work related problems so I end up spending a good fraction of my time in weekends when I feel like u want to code, working on side projects that no one asked for but are within the company's domain. Simply because they're intresting to me and I become A better coder and learn new stuff. Also coding too is about practice. 10000 hours and all that jazz. I have become a better coder because of this. I probably won't do this forever but I'll learn and get better as much as possible from this time.

If you want to build a car from scratch in your weekend or just chill out, that's an equally meaningful and respectable endeavour as well.

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#235

Post by toyg » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 3:02 PM UTC

On some level, I feel for people like him, I really do. They have this massive drive and just cannot understand why others (like me) don't share it. It drives them fundamentally insane, and pushes them towards sociopathic tendencies. Sometimes they "wake up" after decades and have well-documented breakdowns, if they realize their passion was fundamentally pointless. Sometimes they do move the needle.

On other levels, though, just fuck him. His mindset is the typical rationalization of normalizing employee exploitation. If you want cult-like devotion to the cause, build a coop; the minute you take away real ownership of the fruits of one's labour, it is unreasonable to ask for personal sacrifice to any significant degree. You tell me how much you pay me for what, and I'll do "the what", not "the what but something extra too, just because".

As for Google, they now look a lot like early-2000s Microsoft (both inside and outside), but this we kinda knew already.

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#236

Post by rvn1045 » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 3:02 PM UTC

Another post about some Faang employee quitting their jobs and giving their rational for it. It’s thoroughly uninteresting when said employee has already spent years working there and potentially saved millions of dollars. They stuck around long enough to never worry about money and then they write a post about philosophizing their quitting.

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#237

Post by shadowgovt » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 3:02 PM UTC

secondcoming wrote: post #68

itg wrote: post #24

Another "leader" who complains about employees wanting work life balance and they are extremely entitled. These are the type of managers you want to avoid. I'm sure many Googlers are happy you left.

If I swanned off to do yoga during my contracted core hours I'd be sacked

In this case, the company is offering the yoga as something you can do during your work hours.

Google doesn't really have "contracted core hours" precisely. They have quarterly goals. If you're accomplishing those goals, the corporate culture doesn't much care how. This offers flexibility that can make it easier to accomplish tasks (I knew people who worked 6AM-2PM because the center-of-mass of their team was in a different timezone).

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#238

Post by gurumeditations » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 3:02 PM UTC

Yet another person learns what millions of everyday people have learned throughout history: your relationship as an employee with a large corporation is one of minimal give and maximum take. People like the author are the types that give far more than they should and ironically make the situation worse because they hide the failure of the incentive setup through their voluntary overworking (money coming out of their pocket instead of the company’s). If the company was exposed to the true cost of their incentive structure, unwarped by the guy or gal found in every department that pointlessly kills themselves for the company, then the company would be forced to adjust itself, and thus make this guy less disgruntled.

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#239

Post by JKCalhoun » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 3:02 PM UTC

serverholic wrote: post #218

cactus2093 wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another glaring omission - he’s now sitting on 7 years of savings from his Google manager salary & equity. If you have a few million dollars in the bank it’s much easier to take the pay cut to work at a smaller startup and chase a more high risk/high reward outcome. It’s completely out of touch to judge anyone for wanting a stable and in the scheme of things ridiculously high paying job with good work life balance, l…

This is also part of the argument for basic income. Having a stable source of income allows people to take risks like starting their own business or joining a small startup.

Or just a more lax unemployment policy.

I worry that if you give everyone $1000/month:

1) you cannot live on $1000/month so it is an empty gesture

2) rent goes up $1000/month nationwide so it is an even emptier gesture

Re: Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long?

#240

Post by nivenkos » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 3:02 PM UTC

b3kart wrote: post #100

isbvhodnvemrwvn wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you missed the part where he things that working nights and weekends is expected in a job? "we have to do whatever it takes to win"?

Where goalposts for "winning" can conveniently be moved each weekend, I imagine.

Yeah, it should be completely unacceptable.

As you get older you realise how valuable your time is. You only get one life, you aren't saving up or learning more to make your next one easier, you get old and that's it.

Having that time to visit family and friends whilst you can is incredibly important.