Why did I leave Google or, why did I stay so long? • Hacker News Board

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

#821

Post by valdiorn » Thu, Feb 18, 2021, 4:51 PM UTC

ck425 wrote: post #173

izacus wrote: post #99

This is an amazing post - it describes exactly how bad manager looks like and what kind of expectations does he have from his employees. No emergency PTO (despite being a benefit), ability to just get rid of people who don't suit him, cursing at people, not having a proper work/life balance. It just keeps on giving. And all for what? A mapping application having features which really don't save lives 99% of the time.

I agree with all of that except the swearing part. Is swearing in work a big deal in US? I'm Scottish (even worse Glaswegian) so perhaps have a skewed view.

I swear, a lot. I work in London finance. It very much depends on the company. I used to work for a clandestine hedge fund with a pretty crazy culture, and swearing was the way to communicate efficiently. I loved it, it fit my personality.

Now I get a letter from HR if I type "shit" on the team's slack channel. I also notice that people are "selectively offended"; they'll use profanity when it suits them, but if something genuinely ticks you off, and you happen to swear (not AT a person, but at things/concepts/in general) they try to use it as a bazooka against you. Try to make you lose all credibility because you said "it's fucked".

To me, as a non-british person (well, I'm British now, I guess, got my citizenship pre-brexit..) it's a super strange and touchy subject. However, I try to power through, being the "rude foreign guy" (rude as in rude language, not rude as in mean or vindictive), and that sort of works. Almost all of my colleagues just know that's what and who I am, I don't mean any offence, and really, nobody gets offended (unless it suits their strategic purposes). We all use a shitload of profanity in our day to day language anyway, so why the fuck would it be different in the office?

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

#822

Post by DC1350 » Thu, Feb 18, 2021, 5:42 PM UTC

pcthrowaway wrote: post #758

DC1350 wrote: post #618

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

I think this is only true if you have a family and want to live in the tech hub city (instead of a suburb). I'm a Vancouver-based developer who has consistently made about 25-40% less than the national median salary for people with my experience. I agree, the salaries aren't what they are in the U.S., and you certainly won't be buying a house in Vancouver any time soon, but I've made ends meet just fine. In Vancouver…

I guess I'm not really up to date on Vancouver. In the GTA the suburbs aren't much cheaper than the city and needing to buy a car wipes out most of the savings. When I interned in Toronto at an average paying place, there were full time devs in their mid 20s who still lived with their parents and commuted 90 minutes every day. That was the only way they could save for the downpayment on a little condo in the suburbs. It's a really sad lifestyle.

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

#823

Post by jariel » Thu, Feb 18, 2021, 6:17 PM UTC

gonehome wrote: post #818

jariel wrote: post #743

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a good point but it wasn't really 'Ballmer' - it was the existential changes in the industry. I believe if Ballmer had of hung on for a few more years, that change would have happened eventually. Investors eventually would realize 'This is not just Windows and Office'.

I think this is our core disagreement distilled down. I think Ballmer couldn’t have done it, he was too tied up personally in windows. Some of the examples you mention under Ballmer are more examples of strategic failure under his watch. Xbox is the easiest example, the Xbox One’s launch was awful and focus on cable boxes was bad. I don’t think it took a while for investors to realize, I think investors had an accura…

We have hindsight: the changes Ballmer made to increase revenue were not 'one offs' they were substantial.

1) He reconstituted Windows and Office distribution, sales, put office on the cloud.

2) He launched XBox and more notable Azure.

So if you think 'Desktop is dying' (desktop sales were plateauing) then 1 seems like it's going away and cloud isn't a huge business then 2 doesn't matter.

But the prediction was wrong:

A) Even with flatlining desktop sales, Win + Office continued to thrive. Even to this day. It's not a 'legacy business' it's a 'healthy ongoing business.

B) XBox, in particular Azure are huge. Azure makes more money today than Windows generated in revenue when Ballmer took over Microsoft.

Ballmer's failures were mostly Search and Mobile ... both of which were sad, but also they were up against Google Search and iPhone, the best products of our era. XBox and Azure are in very difficult areas, and are doing well.

In hindsight, Ballmer did quite well, there's not a lot to debate unless someone things that Search/Mobile success should have been imminent, but I don't think that's true.

He massively grew and adapted the baseline businesses, and started a few new, huge businesses. Glorious profits all around.

Satya hasn't yet quite made the kind of decisions that will have the lasting impact Ballmer has had, in his defence, he's in an era were the 'new fields of competition' are less obvious.

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

#824

Post by gonehome » Thu, Feb 18, 2021, 6:34 PM UTC

jariel wrote: post #823

gonehome wrote: post #818

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is our core disagreement distilled down. I think Ballmer couldn’t have done it, he was too tied up personally in windows. Some of the examples you mention under Ballmer are more examples of strategic failure under his watch. Xbox is the easiest example, the Xbox One’s launch was awful and focus on cable boxes was bad. I don’t think it took a while for investors to realize, I think investors had an accura…

We have hindsight: the changes Ballmer made to increase revenue were not 'one offs' they were substantial. 1) He reconstituted Windows and Office distribution, sales, put office on the cloud. 2) He launched XBox and more notable Azure. So if you think 'Desktop is dying' (desktop sales were plateauing) then 1 seems like it's going away and cloud isn't a huge business then 2 doesn't matter. But the prediction was wrong…

Azure is huge and a really big deal - I just don't attribute that success to Ballmer. It may have started under his watch, but it was floundering - I think that's one of the things Nadella deserves credit for making successful.

Windows + Office is a legacy product line. It makes money, but it's not the future. They need it obviously, but over-focusing on that at the expense of other things was a mistake.

The Xbox launched in 2001 - was the original one even Ballmer? I think Gates left in 2000? I'm not sure that counts. Xbox One launch/strategy was bad.

I'm not trying to say he did nothing right, but I think we just disagree on his overall performance.

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

#825

Post by xmprt » Thu, Feb 18, 2021, 7:48 PM UTC

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

There's really no good way if you're applying to big corporations. At smaller companies you'll usually get a feel for the people there based on how you feel during the interviews. You might even get to have lunch with the entire team if it's small enough.

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

#826

Post by nly » Thu, Feb 18, 2021, 8:54 PM UTC

bartread wrote: post #725

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!…

> The wealth of the mega corps does allow most goals to be accomplished, at great expense, with Just A Job workers, but people that have experienced being embedded with Really Care workers are going to be appalled at the relative effectiveness. I think the problem is actually deeper than that. I've spent much of my career avoiding megacorps, or even just corps, because I find them pretty frustrating. I have though wo…

Everything you said is spot on and resonated with me personally

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

#827

Post by jeffo2022 » Thu, Feb 18, 2021, 9:04 PM UTC

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!…

Like happiness, work ethic varies by individual overtime. With happiness, people who won the lottery and people who lost a limb were tracked. After a year (after their windfall or trajedy) each was just as happy orbsad as they were prior to the event. Some folks are happy go getters, some are slackers & whiners. The art of leadership is helping the later become the former so they can truly succeed in life (it’s not always about the explicit compensation package, but fairness helps). The leader needs to be clear about the role, deliverables and boundaries of each member of the team and use a framework (like Agile) to keep them in sync to meet spec, time & cost targets aligned with a shared vision to which all are committed. If you’re heart is not in your work, if you’re not living your dream, do yourself a favor and change leaders, projects, companies or career. Life is too short to sell your time to “work” at something for which you have no passion. Get a dream & follow it. The purpose of life is to struggle at what you love, progressing toward a worthy goal. And if being a parent is part of your dream, being a very good one. BALANCE. No one is perfect. We learn from our mistakes and move on. No regrets or sour grapes. Just loving kindness and respect for one another.

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

#828

Post by _carbyau_ » Thu, Feb 18, 2021, 9:56 PM UTC

nmfisher wrote: post #816

_carbyau_ wrote: post #782

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. I find it interesting that Apple has money, hardware, OS, many apps, web presence. And now ARM CPU knowhow. Why aren't they forcibly pushing into Corporate? Sure, they'd have to develop corporate fleet management stuff but at this stage they could buy a few companies and be 80% of the way there. Or build it right from the start for only a handful of their hundreds of billions. How many iphone toting CTOs in y…

Because Apple is fundamentally a consumer company. The marketing and branding that are huge drivers of their success just won’t work as well in the enterprise. Enterprise means people in suits doing sales calls. It’s a patient, one-on-one, handholding process, and it’s just not in Apple’s DNA. Far better for them to come up with some new consumer widget that also leverages their strength in supply chain. That’s what…

While I largely agree with you, Apple can manage more than two things at once and money talks.

Microsoft obviously has large corporate presence, but also Xbox for example.

I just see so many already operational/technical/financial/branding assets in Apples favour compared to incumbents that I'm not sure how they'd fail to make money. OTOH, someone smarter than me in the company clearly thinks otherwise. I just wish I knew what they knew.

Maybe it is as you say, "just not Apple's DNA."

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

#829

Post by silexia » Fri, Feb 19, 2021, 12:03 AM UTC

ryandrake wrote: post #723

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #703

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This point hit home for me: > but people that have experienced being embedded with Really Care workers are going to be appalled at the relative effectiveness. Unless you've experienced the Really Care type of team and situation, it's difficult to understand. I don't mean any disrespect to the Just A Job people. There is nothing wrong with keeping your head down, getting your work done, and checking it at the door whe…

Definitely a spectrum. I think my Level Of Care is directly proportional to how much impact I can actually have, given where I am on the reporting chain totem pole. Where I am on the totem pole often correlates strongly with salary/equity. If I'm down at the bottom, and my impact is limited to moving protobufs from one level in an abstraction stack to another, and my equity's value ebbs and flows with whatever the co…

I am a finance guy... majored in it, worked at Merrill Lynch, and spent the last year building a trading program. I think mergers and acquisitions, venture capital, private equity, etc. actually greatly damage economic growth. Generally all of those finance activities serve to prematurely remove founders from leadership and take skin out of the game.

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

#830

Post by lallysingh » Fri, Feb 19, 2021, 1:12 PM UTC

sangnoir wrote: post #778

lallysingh wrote: post #664

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about this. I think great engineers delete more code than they write. Perhaps something similar is relevant here.

> I think great engineers delete more code than they write. ...but someone has to write the code first, before some of it can be deleted by a great engineer ;)

If it wasn't there before, the great engineer could do something more useful than deleting code!