Live data from Hacker News

Sundar Pichai received $226M compensation, boosted by a triennial stock grant

bloomberg.com

461–470 of 543 posts

Re: Sundar Pichai received $226M compensation, boosted by a triennial stock grant

#461
post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, having a counterpoint with a relevant data point that you missed is “weak” you are ignorant, making your argument weak and just plain wrong. Should people no longer point out when comments are really wrong? You’re also over generalizing while being completely incorrect ie making shit up

You didn't provide a "relevant data point". The base salary for an L3 (rank-and-file) SWE in the Bay Area (which is one of the highest paid areas in the US) is 140K on levels.fyi. You've compared this to the total comp which includes stock (that tanked recently), and a bonus (which isn't guaranteed). You're asserting that you're right and I have no idea what I'm talking about baselessly and being agressive and rude.…

Stock "tanked" 35% from the top after running up for years. It doesn't make the stock component of the compensation zero. Median compensation is >$300K. You could have made your point without making up numbers that are easily fact checked.

Other guy is right, you're misinformed and continuing to argue when you're wrong makes you ignorant and foolish.

Re: Sundar Pichai received $226M compensation, boosted by a triennial stock grant

#462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure if you are being intentionally obtuse, but the obvious answer is that rather than being locked out in the middle of the night, people would prefer to be told directly by a human (ideally their manager), and given the opportunity to say goodbye to their colleagues.

There’s a reason they don’t don that: what if a rogue employee among the thousands laid off decides to leak PII or trade secrets

That’s a complete straw man. Microsoft, Meta and others managed to pull off safely laying off employees while still treating them respectfully and allowing them to say goodbye.

Re: Sundar Pichai received $226M compensation, boosted by a triennial stock grant

#463
post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. The entire tech sector had one of the strongest labor positions in the country for the last decade. It was short sighted not to unionize. Now, layoffs are widespread, compensation is way down, while all the profits go to shareholders. This applies to Google and many other profitable tech companies.

Many, many people in the software industry, especially at a place like Google, absolutely do not want to unionize, and for excellent reasons. Pretty much every union in existence assigns value to union members based on tenure, and it pretty much assumes members are "interchangeable cogs" in most other respects. A lot of people reasonably hate that idea, because they know that they can negotiate for more based on thei…

I understand this argument, and there are definitely many Google engineers who believe this, but I believe this belief to be mistaken. Unfortunately, most engineers really are replaceable cogs.

Google’s origins can be traced back to really smart people innovating through brilliant new algorithms. So it’s understandable why people at Google believe that being brilliant is an irreplaceable asset. If only enough Jeff Deans could be brought together, something amazing would surely happen. But how accurately does this belief match reality? Most successful companies today innovate on product, not raw technology. 99% of product work really can be done by anyone. There are now plenty of multi-billion dollar companies that had original products engineered by total amateurs. Raw technical ability just isn’t that important anymore. And you see this in Google’s business. For how self-proclaimedly smart Googlers are, they sure have a hard time growing the business through new products.

And when I say total comp is down, I’m not talking about existing employees (although their comp is down too for the reason you mention). Go look at job openings near you. More likely than not, base salaries and equity packages will be much lower than before.

Re: Sundar Pichai received $226M compensation, boosted by a triennial stock grant

#464
post #414

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's really irrelevant. Even if compensation was entirely in cash, they'd likely still be shareholders through index fund investing, e.g. most 401k options would invest in the company. Does that mean employees working at an S&P 500 company should never unionize because technically they're shareholders? Employees at Google are made shareholders because its cheaper for the company than paying cash. Employees form an…

> Workers would benefit much more from unionization than they would from holding the stock at a company without a union. Maybe this would work if the employees have some sort of monopoly like the people who work at the ports. However, with knowledge workers there’s a threshold when it’s simply cheaper to move states or even countries. Employees who are well compensated also do not have an incentive to form a union. Y…

Investment bankers job is to deploy capital. How would unionizing help them? Will unionizing increase the amount of capital? No, so no sane person would suggest that.

Software engineers are primarily manufacturers. They make products. The barrier to entry is extremely low for this line of work. I get that you think you’re really smart, but there are tens to hundreds of millions of people in the world who could do your job adequately. Your only leverage is to band together with others doing your work and demand your fair share from the business’ owners.

Re: Sundar Pichai received $226M compensation, boosted by a triennial stock grant

#465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Getting rid of someone because of a fuck up is amateur leadership So you're saying that all these people who were mistakenly hired by Google and were now let go, shouldn't have been let go?

Not at all. Ending someone's employment because they are predicted to be insufficiently beneficial to the organization is a different topic than terminating someone because they made a decision that turned out to be suboptimal, which may have been unreasonable to be able to forecast. It is possible that the suboptimal decision of overhearing was made in such a manner such that indicates the decision maker may not be…

The amount of self loathing in display here is astounding. Or I guess, "temporarily embarrassed millionaire" syndrome?

A hiring decision is a huge change in an employee's life. People uproot their lives, may have to move away from friends and family. They might need visas.

For a big company CEO, getting fired changes basically nothing material. They still have millions of dollars, they most definitely aren't on a work visa.

A rich, profitable company for sure can afford and should try to salvage every suboptimal hiring decision, at least once.

Except for the CEO, that basically gets all the money and no real risk. A CEO will never starve, will never get kicked out of the country, etc.

Re: Sundar Pichai received $226M compensation, boosted by a triennial stock grant

#466

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure if you are being intentionally obtuse, but the obvious answer is that rather than being locked out in the middle of the night, people would prefer to be told directly by a human (ideally their manager), and given the opportunity to say goodbye to their colleagues.

There’s a reason they don’t don that: what if a rogue employee among the thousands laid off decides to leak PII or trade secrets

Guess what: Europe doesn't do instant termination and the roof hasn't collapsed.

Re: Sundar Pichai received $226M compensation, boosted by a triennial stock grant

#467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol, you can spend plenty of time on what you want without millions .. come on! Especially if you have a cozy 200k 40hr/wk 6 weeks of vacation blah blah blah gig

I don't have a cozy 200k 40hr/wk 6 weeks of vacation gig. Would be nice! I'm at about a sixth of that myself, on much longer hours, but I don't work at Google. But even if I did, it wouldn't let me retire within 5 years and still have enough money to live comfortably for the rest of my life, work on whatever I feel like without ever worrying about making money from it, put my kids through university, buy a house next…

Err, I thought time was important? Now you're listing off all of this stuff you don't really need...

Take it from a multi millionaire: it's not that cool. You already have everything you need and more, probably. Start appreciating it..

You sound jealous?

Re: Sundar Pichai received $226M compensation, boosted by a triennial stock grant

#468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have a cozy 200k 40hr/wk 6 weeks of vacation gig. Would be nice! I'm at about a sixth of that myself, on much longer hours, but I don't work at Google. But even if I did, it wouldn't let me retire within 5 years and still have enough money to live comfortably for the rest of my life, work on whatever I feel like without ever worrying about making money from it, put my kids through university, buy a house next…

Err, I thought time was important? Now you're listing off all of this stuff you don't really need... Take it from a multi millionaire: it's not that cool. You already have everything you need and more, probably. Start appreciating it.. You sound jealous?

>> You don't have to think money is everything to understand how earning $225 million in a short time will help you with all the things you do care about, whether it's [list of options]

Re: Sundar Pichai received $226M compensation, boosted by a triennial stock grant

#469

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I observe Google Photos is quite popular. It's from 2015.

For me, Google Photos started a bit earlier: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picasa

I think it was Bump Photoroll not Picasa that became Google Photos: https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/bump

Re: Sundar Pichai received $226M compensation, boosted by a triennial stock grant

#470
C-Level comp should take a hit if they have to do layoffs for any reason. These people should definitly reap it when business is good, but not when it's doing poorly regardless of why. C-Level incentives have tunnel vision to few metrics. Screw 10x developers, these people need to be a 100x and be accountable considering the comp packages they get.
Post reply on HN