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Why I Quit Google to Work for Myself

mtlynch.io

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Re: Why I Quit Google to Work for Myself

#371

Post by [deleted] »

mmcconnell1618 wrote: post #293
whataretensors wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Second, you're a lot better off working at a good company -- MUCH better off I disagree. There is a whole category of people who want high reward for their efforts. There exists no way to get high rewards or royalties outside of starting your own venture. The downside is the risk of course. I do agree that you shouldn't be angry, but there are so many new ways to exist and survive these days.

Working for yourself is no guarantee of higher rewards but it does have the possibility for higher rewards. The key is to focus on opportunities that have the highest potential outcome. I like to think about business opportunities as something that can generate FU money in 10 years or less. If it doesn't meet that level, you might be better off on the slow and steady upper-end corporate gig. A lot of software enginee…

[deleted]

Re: Why I Quit Google to Work for Myself

#372

Post by chocolatebunny »

dep_b wrote: post #72
dahart wrote: post #29

> I drastically reduced the time developers spent repairing those failures, but there were no metrics that tracked developer time. For several jobs in a row, I've felt that helping others on a team is undervalued and under-recorded. I've been planning to implement the "assist" metric, similar to basketball, on my own team for a while. The idea would be something along the lines of everyone gets a set of assist points…

I worked in a remote team once helping a company in Seattle (that perhaps had a bit of a jock culture problem). I could be stuck for days because following the README in a repo just wasn't enough to get the project to compile and run. Every standup I was telling "I'm completely blocked for the last two days because I cannot run the repo, so I cannot run any tests and at the moment I'm doing absolutely nothing.". To b…

There are other issues at play when it comes to helping out remote team members.

When you're co-located with someone you develop better comradery with that person. You'll know them better and they'll come right to your desk when they ask for help so you're more likely to help them. And you sit with them as they execute commands so you can see exactly what's going on.

remote coworkers are easier to ignore, harder to help, and harder to socialize with.

Re: Why I Quit Google to Work for Myself

#373

Post by CodeMage »

dahart wrote: post #29

> I drastically reduced the time developers spent repairing those failures, but there were no metrics that tracked developer time. For several jobs in a row, I've felt that helping others on a team is undervalued and under-recorded. I've been planning to implement the "assist" metric, similar to basketball, on my own team for a while. The idea would be something along the lines of everyone gets a set of assist points…

> For several jobs in a row, I've felt that helping others on a team is undervalued and under-recorded. I've been planning to implement the "assist" metric, similar to basketball, on my own team for a while.

The metric might be a good idea, but I think the real problem goes deeper than that.

Take a step back and ask yourself a more fundamental question: should everyone who does good work be promoted?

By definition, promotions are limited and each level is more difficult to attain than the last one. Obviously, you can't promote everyone. Even worse, not everyone will be happier when promoted. So why does literally everyone want to be promoted? Why do they work so hard to get it?

It's because there are no other ways of rewarding good work. And by "rewarding", I don't only mean "giving people recognition" or "giving people fun work". Those are important and should not be overlooked. Nevertheless, if you don't also give people money, sooner or later they'll fall behind their needs or just the rising costs of everything around them. Then they'll have to choose whether they need money more than intrinsic rewards. And then we're back to the original dilemma: do I play the promotion game or do I just bugger off somewhere where I can get what I need?

TL;DR: Retention shouldn't be only about promotion. Give people real rewards and incentives for doing a good job at their level.

Re: Why I Quit Google to Work for Myself

#374

Post by OOPMan »

Is it just me, or do stories like this make it increasingly clear that working at large companies like Google, Amazon, etc are a mistake?

Getting on a company that becomes Google/Amazon/etc (or more likely doesn't but that's life) is one thing, getting sucked into the corporate dystopia described in that blog post is quite another.

I guess I'll continue to work at smallish start-ups because the idea of being swallowed by a programmer black-hole doesn't appeal :-)

Re: Why I Quit Google to Work for Myself

#375

Post by icebraining »

runevault wrote: post #164
dahart wrote: post #29

> I drastically reduced the time developers spent repairing those failures, but there were no metrics that tracked developer time. For several jobs in a row, I've felt that helping others on a team is undervalued and under-recorded. I've been planning to implement the "assist" metric, similar to basketball, on my own team for a while. The idea would be something along the lines of everyone gets a set of assist points…

Once a team is settled in this can be hard to measure. For me personally I was able to show mine by changing teams and helping drastically inflate overall team velocity, not just by the number of points I added, but how much more productive everyone else became. It is hard to do on an established team where you're already part of it, though, and that's a problem I don't know how to solve.

Go on vacation for a decent period of time? In finance, key employees have mandatory two-week leaves, which serve to detect embezzlement. Here we could have the same, but to detect positive influences.

Re: Why I Quit Google to Work for Myself

#376

Post by bowmessage »

martinraag wrote: post #105

The article really resonated with me, as it's eerily similar to my own experience at Microsoft a couple of years back. Constant reorgs, resulting in projects being cancelled, resulting in lack of motivation, as months of your hard work are thrown out due to unclear decisions by the management. I too was hoping for a senior level promotion. The last project I worked on, I was the only non-senior level developer in a t…

"when meeting my skip-manager (your managers manager) for the first time during my exit interview"

This is a huge issue... You should have more actively met with them.

Re: Why I Quit Google to Work for Myself

#377

Post by tclancy »

Nicksil wrote: post #46
joshuamorton wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Restricted stock unit. Stock compensation in the form of actual shares (not options) that vest over some time period.

I was way off. Thanks a lot for the clarification!

Don't blame yourself, spelling mistakes happen.

Re: Why I Quit Google to Work for Myself

#378

Post by MadBohr »

SiempreViernes wrote: post #348
MadBohr wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This to me sounds like a complete lack of self-ownership on your part. You literally sat blocked doing nothing for days, without reaching out to an individual to help with this? Instead you just spammed Slack saying you're blocked? While I agree that it would have been nice if somebody helped you, you are in control of your own destiny. If nobody is helping you, you need to personally escalate it and reach out until…

The reason is pretty clear, the worked remotely and so had no means to physically reach out but instead had to wait for people to reply on mail.

OP said slack. DM is as simple as doing "/msg @joe.blow I'm blocked, can you please help me?". If no response, go to @joe.blow's colleagues. If still no response, go to their boss. If still no response, go to their bosses's boss. Repeat until you run out of people to escalate to, at which point you find another job.

Re: Why I Quit Google to Work for Myself

#379

Post by Torwald »

dahart wrote: post #29

> I drastically reduced the time developers spent repairing those failures, but there were no metrics that tracked developer time. For several jobs in a row, I've felt that helping others on a team is undervalued and under-recorded. I've been planning to implement the "assist" metric, similar to basketball, on my own team for a while. The idea would be something along the lines of everyone gets a set of assist points…

If you gamify you also have to maintain the game.

Players will game the system, the mere fact that the game exists itself will change the overall dynamics, this and that everything is in constant, natural change, all makes it necessary to maintain the gaming rules.

Re: Why I Quit Google to Work for Myself

#380

Post by riazrizvi »

ironjunkie wrote: post #356

> I was surrounded by the best engineers in the world, using the most advanced development tools in the world. This one might be ironic, but am I the only one feeling really annoyed by the fact that every engineer working at Google feels like every other engineers at Google is "the best in the world" ? Beside the obvious arrogance, I cannot tell if it's a subtle brainwashing or a complete lack of critical thinking. (…

Google, Facebook, Palantir, Microsoft - it's a narrative that those organizations spend dollars to support because it helps them in recruitment and in b2b consulting. It is similar in investment banking and management consulting. The employees lap it up, and learn to talk-the-talk. Each of these tech companies are cash cows with huge locked-in revenue streams that do not depend so much on innovation for survival. IMO Amazon and Apple seem to be organized around accountability and sink or swim projects which create a different walk-the-walk culture, similar to start ups. Though I'm just an outsider looking in.
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