Google was beloved as an employer for years. Then it laid off thousands by email • Hacker News Board

Re: Google was beloved as an employer for years. Then it laid off thousands by email

#81

Post by eitally » Tue, Mar 21, 2023, 7:36 PM UTC

cromwellian wrote: post #18

SQueeeeeL wrote: post #2

Was Google really a beloved employer? I feel like that was vapor marketing hype most real people saw through as bs, you'd pretty much see constant stories of overwork and toxic teams run by incompetent "project managers" just like every other overvalued Silicon Valley FAANG shop

As someone who worked at Google for 15 yrs, who also worked at Oracle and IBM, I can confidently say that Google was the least toxic, least overworked place I've ever been. That's not to say there aren't management problems, especially around the erratic way they launch new projects and kill others with no real rhyme or reason, but working environment was never one of the complaints. At IBM and Oracle, I'd regularly…

I worked in Cloud from 2015-2023. I was personally hired by Amit Singh, who was the first "CEO" of "Cloud", back when it was just "Google Apps" + GCS/GCE/GAE. About 8 months later Diane Greene was brought in to scale the business because the org under Amit was too googley. Literally. Google's legacy culture of engineering meritocracy and ICs who vote with their feet on the "best" projects was not conducive to becoming an enterprise technology company. Diane brought in Diane Bryant as COO (from Intel) and PH Ferrand as sales president (from Dell), and while PH gave it a good try on the GTM side, Diane left after barely 6 months and there just wasn't enough enterprise experience across the org to make things work. Diane was likely brought in at least partly because she is googley, and her VMWare history probably looked like enterprise software success, but she was too googley to turn the ship and he org flailed for a couple more years. Then the board appointed TK, who absolutely knows 100% how to sell to enterprise. He spent 2 years almost exclusively hiring senior staff from outside: Microsoft, SAP, AWS, IBM, Salesforce, Oracle, etc, and rebuilding something that looks roughly like if Microsoft went back in time 20 years.

The upsides are that the business has grown mightily and Cloud is now almost exclusively market driven, at least on core products/services. The downside is that he broke the culture and alienated thousands of googlers whose advancement opportunities were essentially eliminated. Because of the hiring needs, the bar is much lower now, cronyism is prevalent, and politics+bureaucracy get in the way of progress.

During my years at Google, I sat in The Quad, Tech Corners, Moffett Park, and then back at Tech Corners, and spent time in many of the rest of the bay area offices. I will state with confidence that the Cloud offices do not feel "googley" when you walk around the cube spaces. There are few decorations, no buzz, not many people who appear to be enjoying themselves, very few tech talks, guest speakers or events, etc. Just taking a walk around the MP, Matilda or TC campuses and then visiting YT in San Bruno or one of the Android teams in MTV is a stark difference.

Cloud is not googley. Let's see if the consumer-oriented PAs can keep that alive.

Re: Google was beloved as an employer for years. Then it laid off thousands by email

#82

Post by VirusNewbie » Tue, Mar 21, 2023, 7:40 PM UTC

tenpies wrote: post #37

pwinnski wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At Google, developers were the product, not overhead. As such, they were supported lavishly, with meals and massages, at a level not previously seen, at least not in career available to people who weren't fifth-generation Ivy grads. And the pay, total comp is still trumpeted here at HN as among the highest around. Sure, a lot of people saw those perks as being aimed a particular demographic: young people without atta…

> As such, they were supported lavishly, with meals and massages, at a level not previously seen, at least not in career available to people who weren't fifth-generation Ivy grads. I think if you push further back, we did see it. Go find the oldest retired IBMer you can and ask them what it was like in the good days. You'll find it was very similar. Sure, they didn't do the whole come-be-an-activist-while-ignoring-yo…

> Go find the oldest retired IBMer you can and ask them what it was like in the good days. You'll find it was very similar.

I don't think this was true. Before Google really started poaching everyone, big tech engineering jobs were almost always lower paid than almost any managerial job, and compensation was never in line with lawyers or medical doctors.

Plenty of people who put in 10+ years at FAANG companies have enough to retire, did you really see IBM engineers retiring in their 40s (or, the ability to if they wanted?).

I've been in the industry for over 20 years, and when I started, regardless of how good of an engineer you were, unless you hit it big with an IPO riches were not to be had. That has changed drastically in the last fifteen years.

Re: Google was beloved as an employer for years. Then it laid off thousands by email

#83

Post by optymizer » Tue, Mar 21, 2023, 7:40 PM UTC

deltree7 wrote: post #38

costanzaDynasty wrote: post #21

I may be a very basic software engineer with neither high YOE or high quality skills but what would I get excited about from a FAANG job nowadays? These companies that I've used everyday for nearing 2 decades from even a user perspective have become stale. Mountains of money and the best talent and even simple issues that have lingered for years are not fixed in favor of big ideas that no one wants.

Don't worry, you'll never get into FANG companies.

What a mean thing to say to someone. I've been telling people the exact opposite for years - with enough time and motivation, anyone can get into FAANG companies, it's just a question of how much time and energy you want to dedicate to that.

Contrast this with becoming an astronaut or a gymnast, or a tennis player, or anything that requires you to acquire physical skills starting at a very early age and do it for decades.

I've been almost 10 years at FAANGs. There's nothing special about me. My GPA was 2.75. I suppose I can code and at this point I have some experience, but I'm no Carmack.

Re: Google was beloved as an employer for years. Then it laid off thousands by email

#84

Post by mathattack » Tue, Mar 21, 2023, 7:42 PM UTC

super256 wrote: post #57

aix1 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Overwork? Toxic teams? Project managers running teams? I've been at Google for a very long time, in quite a few orgs, and none of those things ring any bells. (Some probably exist in some pockets, though the last one sounds particularly implausible. It's just not how Google job ladders and the management structure work.) Now, I have to admit to having not read the article, but the headline does resonate. I've spoken…

> Overwork? I don't know anyone working at Google, nor anyone who worked at Google in the past (except a single intern). Hell, I don't even live anywhere near a Google campus! But I always assumed that Google wants you to spend your whole day there, from morning until evening. Because big tech is usually implicitly aiming at that. - Serve three major meals a day, + you can bring your dog to your office, which elimina…

Part of the reason the average tenure is so short is companies usually quote Median, and that’s low by definition in high growth companies. If you double your headcount in 2 years, your median will be less than 2 years even if nobody quits.

Re: Google was beloved as an employer for years. Then it laid off thousands by email

#85

Post by slaw » Tue, Mar 21, 2023, 7:46 PM UTC

rejectfinite wrote: post #53

This whole saga has been funny to someone in Sweden... Here it is 1-3 month lay off time, eg you need to find out in advance and your employer needs to find out in advance if you leave. For full time hires. There is 6month probation. Expecting a company to do good when it does not have to is madness.

Apples and Oranges. There are no jobs in Sweden that pay $300k.

Re: Google was beloved as an employer for years. Then it laid off thousands by email

#86

Post by super256 » Tue, Mar 21, 2023, 7:47 PM UTC

jchw wrote: post #70

super256 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Overwork? I don't know anyone working at Google, nor anyone who worked at Google in the past (except a single intern). Hell, I don't even live anywhere near a Google campus! But I always assumed that Google wants you to spend your whole day there, from morning until evening. Because big tech is usually implicitly aiming at that. - Serve three major meals a day, + you can bring your dog to your office, which elimina…

I worked at Google for three years. It was a great experience and I mainly left because I had grown accustomed to remote work and was planning on moving back to live closer to family after having a falling out with the bay area. I do get the impression that people have had vastly differing experiences at Google, but the culture was very laid back. Deadline pressure existed, but ultimately it never felt that bad: if w…

First: Thank you for sharing your experience! But I have one question, I'd be glad to get some clarification.

> I'm pretty sure once you're L4 or so you can pretty much coast. I heard a similar thing when I was at Google, but knew of many counter examples within my circle of coworkers.

Do you mean that there are employees who were below L4 and have not been promoted in the past two years?

Or do you mean that you know employees, who are L4, but haven't promoted to L5 in the past two years?

In general, it seems (judging from HN comments) like L4 is the minimum growth expectation.

Re: Google was beloved as an employer for years. Then it laid off thousands by email

#87

Post by dekhn » Tue, Mar 21, 2023, 7:49 PM UTC

cromwellian wrote: post #45

dekhn wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked for Google for 10 years- at first in a great but intense (overworked) SRE team, then later as a SWE running my own project (again intense and overworked, but totally self-imposed) and then on various ML and 3D printing teams. By and large it was great, but it got worse over time (increasingly clueless managers with night-school MBAs) and more toxic. Occasionally I'd see memes or posts from other teams that d…

Wow, I'm shocked to hear that. Was this at a US office? I know some overseas offices have different culture. I guess it's not unprecedented. My wife (eng manager) resigned from Google around 2015 I think, in part because Google Cloud had brought on a new boss in a re-org who was a McKinsey-and-associates person, and her boss tasked her mostly with making spreadsheets of business processes, because that's the format s…

Mountain View. In fact during the nest debacle there was a whole office building of people doing nothing with a clock on the wall which was "how long until Tony Fadell no longer controls you" counting down the days.

Re: Google was beloved as an employer for years. Then it laid off thousands by email

#88

Post by munificent » Tue, Mar 21, 2023, 7:51 PM UTC

deltree7 wrote: post #35

The only thing that matters in a layoff is "severance package" Everything else is useless. If your co-workers liked you and wanted to say goodbye, they will call and throw a party. If I'm fired, there is no reason for me to log on to my workstation. All relevant documents are given to you anyway. Your personal items will be shipped to you.

This is true for spherical employed human resource units in a vacuum.

It is less true for living breathing members of Homo sapiens.

Re: Google was beloved as an employer for years. Then it laid off thousands by email

#89

Post by munificent » Tue, Mar 21, 2023, 7:55 PM UTC

super256 wrote: post #57

aix1 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Overwork? Toxic teams? Project managers running teams? I've been at Google for a very long time, in quite a few orgs, and none of those things ring any bells. (Some probably exist in some pockets, though the last one sounds particularly implausible. It's just not how Google job ladders and the management structure work.) Now, I have to admit to having not read the article, but the headline does resonate. I've spoken…

> Overwork? I don't know anyone working at Google, nor anyone who worked at Google in the past (except a single intern). Hell, I don't even live anywhere near a Google campus! But I always assumed that Google wants you to spend your whole day there, from morning until evening. Because big tech is usually implicitly aiming at that. - Serve three major meals a day, + you can bring your dog to your office, which elimina…

> I always assumed that Google wants you to spend your whole day there, from morning until evening.

People always cynically assume that's why Google has the perks but in all the Google offices I've worked from or visited, the building is a ghost town after 6:00pm.

The real reason is that Google is competing with other tech companies and perks are an effective incentive to get people to pick your company over another one.

> Because big tech is usually implicitly aiming at that.

Tech companies are aiming for maximum long term productivity of intellectually challenging complex work. I'm not aware of any data that shows the way to get that is by grinding your employees into the dust with overtime.

Re: Google was beloved as an employer for years. Then it laid off thousands by email

#90

Post by nostrademons » Tue, Mar 21, 2023, 8:01 PM UTC

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #71

mingus88 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Before the doubleclick merger, Google was absolutely the ideal place to work as an engineer. I feel that perhaps after 2007 a lot of Google's reputation was still held up by what the culture was like in the years surrounding their IPO. But of course, this is ancient tech history. I haven't entertained a Google recruiter in probably a decade now.

I wasn't there in 2007, didn't get there til 2011, but looking at the facts think 2007/2008 era it seems like a juncture from one Google to the next, for sure. The other, really major, shift -- which happened while I was there -- was Patrick Pichette leaving as CFO and Ruth Porat coming on. And then the subsequent "Alphabetization" which... it was so bungled and mismanaged... and it was clear at that point L&S were c…

(I was there 2009-2014 and again 2020-present. Worked with several single/double-digit employee number Googlers.)

IMHO the "eras" of Google were:

1.) 1998-2001. Origins. Larry was CEO, company was still basically in the garage or the PayPal offices in Palo Alto, everything was an ad-hoc scrappy startup.

2.) 2001-2004. Growth. Eric was CEO. They moved into the Googleplex. Exploring new lines of business (Groups, AdSense, GMail, Maps/Earth), but they were all just explorations, and most of the company remained focused on Search. Key infrastructure like GFS, MapReduce, BigTable, Stubby, Sawzall were invented.

3.) 2004-2008. Conglomeration. Eric was CEO. IPO. Big college-hiring push started in this era (remember the Google Labs Aptitude Test?), as did a push to hire outside managers from other companies. GMail, Maps, Labs, Scholar, Toolbar, Chrome, Android all launched, and Docs/Sheets/Slides/YouTube were acquired. This is when the modern Google product portfolio was built, and much of its current culture and processes solidified.

4.) 2009-2010. Interregnum. Eric was CEO. Financial crisis happened here, which basically shut down growth, and it also faced serious competitive threats from Bing, iPhones, etc. As a result the culture during the interregnum almost harkened back to the 2001-2004 era: there was a refocusing on core search/ads/infrastructure and a generally scrappier mentality.

5.) 2011-2015. Google+ & X. Larry was CEO again, company shifted to make everything about G+. There was an overall futile attempt to address a major competitive threat that turned out not to matter anyway.

6.) 2015-2020. Alphabetization. Sundar was CEO, but Ruth came in as CFO and realistically runs the company. Finance plays a much bigger role - I don't think Google's produced a single successful new product post-2015 (come to think of it, there weren't many new successes post-2009), but revenue has grown through continued optimization and profits have grown through cost-cutting.

7.) 2020+. Post-COVID. Culture was hurt significantly by remote work, it's very hard to realign the company to adapt to outside changes.

The irony is that what many Googlers nostalgically think of "Google culture" actually came from the 2004-2008 era, when Eric was CEO and many of the new hires either came from college or outside companies. If you listen to pre-IPO hires, they'll say that very early Google culture was a lot scrappier, a lot less entitled, a lot more opinionated, a lot more willing to take top-down direction from Larry specifically, and a lot more focused on the work itself and how to deliver excellent technical solutions quickly.