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

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

#611

Post by thethethethe »

ZephyrBlu wrote: post #603
thethethethe wrote: post #587

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think it's reasonable to assume that not everyone is going to like everything that you say. Sure but it's really not that hard to keep things under control in the work place. I have my own opinions, sometimes I share them at work, sometimes people may disagree, however, I don't "rack up multiple HR complaints" like this guy did.

"After the acquisition, I was invited to speak on many different Google panels and events and very quickly, I began racking up my HR complaints. I used a four letter word, my analogy was not PC, my language was not PG" Firstly, these came from events he was _invited_ to speak at. If you invite someone to speak and then don't let them speak their mind what was the point in inviting them? Secondly, as a non-american no…

I'm sorry but this makes no sense. So what if he was invited to speak? Can we not hold people accountable for their actions just because they were invited to speak?

How do you know whether or not the things he said were worthy of reporting to HR? He didn't say what they were for a reason

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

#612

Post by [deleted] »

kyawzazaw wrote: post #481
scrose wrote: post #196

If you’re a new engineer reading this article: Startups are talked about as if work-life balance doesn’t or shouldn’t exist. It only doesn’t exist if you (1) choose for that to be the case or (2) Have a manager like this who holds things like firing you if ‘someone better comes along’ over your head. There are plenty of startups where you can put in your ~8 hours and call it a day 99% of the time and the business wil…

How do you check for and avoid (2) in new grad interview stages? Especially when you are not assigned to a team when applying

[deleted]

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

#613

Post by throwmeaway_66 »

01100011 wrote: post #601
throwmeaway_66 wrote: post #530

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a good point and that's the drop of fear climbing making his way up to my brain. But I interview around, I got some offers that I have declined so far and I do some work, just a few hours a week. You wrote: "Compensation for a job is about more than money. It's about where you end up as a person when the job is over.". It sounds good in theory, but in practice? Should I switch job, maybe/likely accepting less…

I didn't say you should quit your job. Ride that train as long as you can. I'm saying you should manage yourself. If you only work half the day, spend the other half of the day: - Look for opportunities to contribute more at your job. Don't wait for a manager to tell you what to do. Rewrite some code. Propose a new feature. Improve the documentation. Write more tests. - Teach yourself new skills. Don't just skim book…

All very good points. However, if you do (1) (Look for opportunities at work), you don't have the time and energy for (2) and (3) with the regularity needed for making serious advances. At that point, you have a well-paid, non-stressful, truly full-time job. I would skip (1) and keep mostly (3) (well, that's what I do, more than advice. A pat on my shoulder, if you will). They are not paying you more, the more you do, the more troubles, stress, and annoyances you call in your direction, and when the tide turns, it is not that they are looking at some code review you did or improved documentation you wrote to keep you onboard.

As I like to say: there is no second life, the only one that was build was virtual and "failed".

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

#614

Post by modeless »

dwohnitmok wrote: post #604
modeless wrote: post #588

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing you quoted literally said it was "unfair" for employers to expect passion from their at-will employees. I guess you're saying it's fine for employers to "desire" passion but not to "expect" it? OK, sure.

> I guess you're saying it's fine for employers to "desire" passion but not to "expect" it? I'm personally saying it isn't really the business of the employer to talk about employee passion to begin with. In the same way that the employer may desire an employee to keep a clean home and healthy living habits, because of the various signaling benefits it has for their job duties, but it isn't really the employer's busi…

OK, but that's very far from the quote you originally made. So you can understand my initial confusion.

While I agree that there should not be a specific job requirement to keep a clean home and healthy living habits independent of job performance, I absolutely disagree that employers shouldn't "talk" about it in general terms. It's perfectly appropriate for companies to encourage and help their employees to lead healthy lives (e.g. providing healthy food, gym access, encouraging taking vacation time, promoting appropriate work-life balance, etc), just as it is appropriate for companies to encourage having passion for the mission even if it isn't strictly a job requirement.

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

#615

Post by gresrun »

jeffbee wrote: post #602
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #363

9 years @ Google, and I too came from a company acquired by Google. (In my case, Google did not keep our product or tech stack around, so.) And yes, I can say many Googlers are entitled. It's a fair descriptor. And the pace of work is slower than a startup. In general. And I too have many criticisms of Google. But. Google has entirely different revenue constraints. It can afford an entirely different way of working.…

I've worked at 8 different companies and none of them could even hold a candle to Google's pace of work. Everything just works. The quota system works, the identity and authorization system works, observability works, the build and release system works. You can be a productive engineer at Google on day 2 if you read the codelabs on day 1. Nobody at Google has ever needed to have their manager email the Jira admin to…

5+ yrs @ Google, Google is my 5th company.

Google has all the building blocks for great backend services and front-end development and, if you know where to look and have some experience with them, you can build a rock-solid product in Politics/consensus building is where the real roadblocks lie in Google, and presumably other large companies. Trying to make high-level product & technical decisions when you have 10 stakeholders with 3 VPs, all in different orgs, is serious exercise in patience; months of emails & meetings await you.

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

#616

Post by dwohnitmok »

Viliam1234 wrote: post #592
modeless wrote: post #522

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> when their own continued employment is contingent on whether management thinks they're still necessary Talk about entitlement. You think that when a company hires you, that should be a commitment to employ you forever regardless of need? Passion can come from your own investment in the success of the business, through equity and through the opportunities that come to productive employees at growing companies, both…

> passion does not come from a guarantee of continued employment. Then why do founders work harder than hired managers?

I think the answer for most people is perceived control of one's destiny.

As long as that holds, I think a lot of people, especially founder types, are happy. The moment that's wrested away, whether by excessive board oversight, or by perceived meddling from investors, or by perceived interference by a manager, passion drops.

That's why autonomy was so important for the article writer.

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

#617

Post by paulcole »

jpm_sd wrote: post #20
paulcole wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole thing is one red flag after another, but the biggest standout to me is the author being annoyed coworkers are taking personal days. That’s what they’re there for! When I don’t want to work, I use the benefit that lets me not work.

Try managing a team where people take last minute personal days all the time, without having to give advance notice or a reason.

I've got a chronic illness and I have personal days. I don't plan when I can't work. Deal with it, don't give me personal days, or fire me.

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

#618

Post by DC1350 »

ska wrote: post #408
bradlys wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really varies on the company and where you live. Where I am, unless you’re at a select few companies, you’ll barely make ends meet or have to choose to live a particularly subpar lifestyle for a professional.

Unless you set a really unusual bar for "subpar lifestyle for a professional" this is a very atypical situation. If you think of "professional" jobs only, developers typically have better than average compensation for around the least barrier to entry. The lack of need for credentials tends to translate to significantly less debt (more so US & maybe Canada specific) and earlier career trajectory entry too. This may b…

Most Canadian developers don't get paid enough to live in the tech hub cities.

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

#619

Post by lelele »

CodeMage wrote: post #561
iandanforth wrote: post #108

I think his derision of entitled ladder-climbing employees is valid from the perspective of someone who sees "building something valuable" as the point of employment. There is a whole community however that sees wealth acquisition as the point of employment. Even if it's "merely" joining the ranks of the top 5% this is lauded as success by many. Lawyers, doctors, consultants, stock traders, all the high paying profes…

> I think his derision of entitled ladder-climbing employees is valid from the perspective of someone who sees "building something valuable" as the point of employment. Call me cynical and jaded, but I don't believe "building something valuable" is the point of employment . "Building something valuable" is the point of my vocation . I used to believe that the employment and vocation should align. Over the course of m…

> I used to believe that the employment and vocation should align.

> If your employment and your vocation align, it's a nice bonus.

That is the meaning of "should", isn't it? And even if they don't align 100%, you can always strive for a maximum.

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

#620

Post by Rebelgecko »

JohnCarmack wrote: post #586

I can certainly see a lot of parallels with Oculus / Facebook. Perhaps unusually, I actually wanted FB to impress itself more strongly on Oculus post acquisition because, frankly, Oculus was a bit of a mess. Instead, Oculus was given an enormous amount of freedom for many years. Personally, nobody ever told me what to do, even though I was willing to "shut up and soldier" if necessary -- they bought that capability!…

Just curious, what things did you want/expect FB to be more hands-on about? General things like company organization, or more specific product decisions (I'm thinking of one particularly controversial product decision but I understand if that's a sensitive topic)?
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