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Former Googlers on how they knew it was time to quit

businessinsider.com

41–50 of 54 posts

Re: Former Googlers on how they knew it was time to quit

#41

In the era of Sundar it has become harder and harder to recommend Google as a place to work to friends. Trust me, it is quite noticeable on the inside when the company stops being run by the founders, and starts being run by an MBA with no vision. Posted anonymously to avoid work repercussions. -Googler of > 5.5years

The MBA hate on HN is insane. Engineers aren't magically better than everybody.

Re: Former Googlers on how they knew it was time to quit

#42

In the era of Sundar it has become harder and harder to recommend Google as a place to work to friends. Trust me, it is quite noticeable on the inside when the company stops being run by the founders, and starts being run by an MBA with no vision. Posted anonymously to avoid work repercussions. -Googler of > 5.5years

The MBA hate on HN is insane. Engineers aren't magically better than everybody.

Same reasoning can be applied to Magically Better Administrators

Re: Former Googlers on how they knew it was time to quit

#43

In the era of Sundar it has become harder and harder to recommend Google as a place to work to friends. Trust me, it is quite noticeable on the inside when the company stops being run by the founders, and starts being run by an MBA with no vision. Posted anonymously to avoid work repercussions. -Googler of > 5.5years

The MBA hate on HN is insane. Engineers aren't magically better than everybody.

Many of us had the experience of working for a nontechnical manager. It's always been surprising that companies think technical work can be managed by an average non-technical manager. I had one great non-technical manager, he just wanted me to explain what was going on and then let me do it, made suggestions, kept me apprised of priorities. It's disastrous for beginning devs.

Re: Former Googlers on how they knew it was time to quit

#44

In the era of Sundar it has become harder and harder to recommend Google as a place to work to friends. Trust me, it is quite noticeable on the inside when the company stops being run by the founders, and starts being run by an MBA with no vision. Posted anonymously to avoid work repercussions. -Googler of > 5.5years

I’ve been at Google about as long as you, and I’ve heard folks say some variation of this since the day I started. Personally, while there may be political or spiritual changes further up the ladder I’ve noticed no real change in my day-to-day over the last five years.

Re: Former Googlers on how they knew it was time to quit

#45

>Interviews One of the people featured is a friend and former coworker at a different company. When I sent him this link, he said they never talked to him. They just pulled info off of his blog.

"Interviews" doesn't actually appear in the text of the article or its title. What does appear in the text is a very clear description of where the information came from.

"We spoke to several former Googlers to find out why they left the company, compiling their responses with those of other former employees who have written about their departures publicly."

I'm am, once again, quite impressed by hn's top comments.

Re: Former Googlers on how they knew it was time to quit

#46

>Interviews One of the people featured is a friend and former coworker at a different company. When I sent him this link, he said they never talked to him. They just pulled info off of his blog.

Par for the course for business insider.

The total misrepresentation by the comment of what the article claims? Par for the course for hn.

Re: Former Googlers on how they knew it was time to quit

#47

I worked at Google for close to 10 years. I resigned when I had made enough money to retire comfortably (for the next 40 years) in a European city. The first two years were enjoyable but then it started going downhill, fast. Some close friends and co-workers had major implosions on the job and I was burned out. Once I realized that Google would suck me dry if I let it and that reality was completely different to the…

Was the burnout Google-specific, or do you think it would have likely happened at other tech companies as well?

Re: Former Googlers on how they knew it was time to quit

#48

>Interviews One of the people featured is a friend and former coworker at a different company. When I sent him this link, he said they never talked to him. They just pulled info off of his blog.

"Interviews" doesn't actually appear in the text of the article or its title. What does appear in the text is a very clear description of where the information came from. "We spoke to several former Googlers to find out why they left the company, compiling their responses with those of other former employees who have written about their departures publicly." I'm am, once again, quite impressed by hn's top comments.

Ok, I know I saw that somewhere when I commented. Did the headline change? It’s clearly not in the article now.

Re: Former Googlers on how they knew it was time to quit

#49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Par for the course for business insider.

The total misrepresentation by the comment of what the article claims? Par for the course for hn.

I commented to another reply. This formerly said “Interviews...” I didn’t pull that out of thin air. Something changed after my comment.

Re: Former Googlers on how they knew it was time to quit

#50

I left Google because I was working on a crank that was attached to a spindle. It was super boring and what I was learning did not accrue to anything that was valuable outside the company. Otherwise it was a fine place to work. No better than Microsoft or Netflix or the rest, but no worse either.

That's basically what happened to me. I got bored after a while, working on a small feature on v8 of something. Fixing bugs and not having much testing for my system was a drag. The original leader of my mature product team was good, but he left and then a first time overly confident bro was the leader. We reported issues but new upper level management didn't matter.
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