I'm quitting Google!

[cmndr]

I've been at Google just under 4 years and the initial equity grant (so something like $1M in stocks vesting over 4 years) is about to run out. It's time for a change.
 

The team you land on matters. On paper I had my dream job that leveraged my skills and drew from hobbies. In reality, I discovered that how well you fit in with your organization and especially your manager REALLY matters. I'll be going somewhere where I am happier and my talents are better utilized... I've heard Facebook pays more (have a referral lined up) and Apple (also have a referral), oddly enough, might be a bit better suited to my work style.

Ask me anything - I won't promise to answer because I don't want to disparage anyone but... ask away.

Free food is good. The gym was good before COVID hit and I could go into the office.

[cmndr]

1 hour ago, James Evens said:

Is the working culture at google equal to what Microsoft showed at insight this year?

https://diversity.google/commitments/
"At Google, we care deeply about hiring, retaining, and progressing a workforce that reflects the billions of users we serve. To help underrepresented communities continue to feel at home at Google, we work closely with 60+ organizations that are dedicated to advancing global workforce diversity. "

I think quoting a publicly available website doesn't count as disparagement. When they say representing the users of the world, they don't mean getting their employee base to around 59.8% Asian (or ~50% if you throw out China completely) to match the overall global distribution.
https://diversity.google/annual-report/representation/


Latinos are generally referred to as LatinX. This is not something I'd seen much of and I grew up around a lot of Latinos. Dealing with a small N but 100% of the Latinos I've asked don't care for the term.



Here's a guide on words you're not supposed to use - https://developers.google.com/style/word-list

Quote

Don't use blacklist, whitelist, and graylist.

sane - Don't use. Instead use a word like valid or sensible.
sanity check - Don't use.

guys, you guys - When referring to a group of people use non-gendered language, such as everyone or folks.

ninja - Don't use to refer to a person. Instead, use a term such as expert.

 

old, older - Don't use to refer to a previous version of a product. Instead, use earlier.

build cop, build sheriff - Don't use. Instead, use a more precise term like build monitor.

male adapter - Don't use. Instead, use a genderless word like plug.

man hours, manhours, man-hours - Avoid using gendered terms. Instead use terms like person hours.

man-in-the-middle (MITM) - Avoid using gendered terms. Instead use terms like on-path attacker, person-in-the-middle (PITM).

war room, warroom, war-room - Don't use. Instead, use a more precise term to describe the activity or team. Depending on context, possible alternatives include rapid response team, situation response team, situation room, incident-management team, or media monitoring room.

webmaster, web master - Don't use. Instead, use a more precise term to describe the specific role, such as website owner, website administrator, web content manager, owner of a site.

 

 

I expect Facebook, Apple and most other companies that have a substantial number of Stanford, Yale, Berkeley, etc. alumns to have similar official value sets.

[Imbadatnames]

1 hour ago, cmndr said:

Latinos are generally referred to as LatinX. This is not something I'd seen much of and I grew up around a lot of Latinos. Dealing with a small N but 100% of the Latinos I've asked don't care for the term.



Here's a guide on words you're not supposed to use - https://developers.google.com/style/word-list

 

 

I expect Facebook, Apple and most other companies that have a substantial number of Stanford, Yale, Berkeley, etc. alumns to have similar official value sets.

You can’t even pronounce Latinx in Spanish…

 

That list is fucking ridiculous 

[dilpickle]

I thought this thread was gonna be about you not using Google services anymore. That would have been even more dramatic.

[IkeaGnome]

I use Google a lot. Can you tell me where I live?

/s kind of

[randomGuy512]

1 minute ago, IkeaGnome said:

I use Google a lot. Can you tell me where I live?

/s kind of

I'm sure google knows, but you would have to hack them to find out.  Google's security against people finding your info is pretty good until you pay them, because if it wasn't they would'nt have anything to charge you for.  

[cmndr]

1 hour ago, IkeaGnome said:

I use Google a lot. Can you tell me where I live?

/s kind of

I take user privacy policies seriously.

Also looking up anyone's personal information is cause for termination and possibly a lawsuit.

 

1 hour ago, randomGuy512 said:

I'm sure google knows, but you would have to hack them to find out.  Google's security against people finding your info is pretty good until you pay them, because if it wasn't they would'nt have anything to charge you for.  

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/google-says-it-doesnt-sell-your-data-heres-how-company-shares-monetizes-and

Google generally sells access to an algorithm or API that allows user targeting OR summary information (think people who like X also like Y) that might be useful for market research but is hard to use for individual identification.

Google does a FAR better job of protecting individual privacy than most people believe. Well, unless there's a court order.

[randomGuy512]

7 minutes ago, cmndr said:

Google generally sells access to an algorithm or API that allows user targeting OR summary information (think people who like X also like Y) that is hard to use for individual identification.

Google does a FAR better job of protecting individual privacy than most people believe. Well, unless there's a court order.

Exactly, what I meant was they are very secure and make it hard to get a user's info so other people can't make a targeting database that would jeopardise their products.  But they wouldn't sell an individual's data (except allegedly people within might for a bribe), so you would have to hack them to get that.  

[Commodus]

I wouldn't consider Google's efforts at inclusion to be deal-breakers... that language, for instance? Google's clearly trying to walk on eggshells, but a lot of it is really easy to avoid. Don't use language that assumes a male-first world; don't treat people's traits (age, mental health, etc.) as negatives. Be considerate.

 

As for the job shift: while this is certainly your choice, I'd think it would be considerably easier to jump to Apple instead of Meta given the better attitude toward privacy.

[cmndr]

41 minutes ago, randomGuy512 said:

Exactly, what I meant was they are very secure and make it hard to get a user's info so other people can't make a targeting database that would jeopardise their products.  But they wouldn't sell an individual's data (except allegedly people within might for a bribe), so you would have to hack them to get that.  

I'm going to publicly speculate that companies like Facebook, Apple, Microsoft, etc. all have pretty stringent data logging policies set up that ensure that a rogue employee can be identified before they do something to create a massive legal risk. I suspect that very few people at companies like that have seen actual customer emails and associated data (outside of specific customer support roles).

 

If you throw enough money at me and 95+% of my colleagues are great, I'd be willing to put up with a lot of BS.

 

35 minutes ago, Commodus said:

I wouldn't consider Google's efforts at inclusion to be deal-breakers... that language, for instance? Google's clearly trying to walk on eggshells, but a lot of it is really easy to avoid. Don't use language that assumes a male-first world; don't treat people's traits (age, mental health, etc.) as negatives. Be considerate.

 

As for the job shift: while this is certainly your choice, I'd think it would be considerably easier to jump to Apple instead of Meta given the better attitude toward privacy.

Yeah, the culture stuff isn't a deal breaker in and of itself. It's mostly HOW my work is being recognized and my current manager. The two managers preceding her were FAR better.


With that said - in most educated circles, people will criticize the British for their imperialist tenancies and their desire to wipe out and "civilize" other cultures. There IS some overlap here - there are people who seek to exterminate cultures that they have a low affinity for. If you think colonialism is wrong but are 100% fine with experimenting with others' cultures... there's an element of hypocrisy.

 

Would you feel comfortable going to Slovakia or Mongolia or Kazakhstan and saying you are far more moral and that everyone there needs to be "fixed" and all they need to do is to "dump their toxic culture?" The people I've met from those places have noted that there are large circles that are far less progressive than the American working class.

Morality is kind of relative... people alive during the reign of Commodus (the emperor) for example would have been absolutely repulsed at the defiling of the station of the paterfamilis, seeing it as putting the lives and well-being of large swathes of people in jeopardy.
 

It's usually the most self-righteous "I'm doing good" types that end up being the villains when retrospectives are done on history. If you think they're a good person you can forgive yourself being bad at times. There's empirical evidence of this.
 

[BuckGup]

I feel you. Corporate companies are damaging to your mental health. Check out this website for non shit corp jobs 

https://www.techjobsforgood.com/

 

[cmndr]

1 minute ago, BuckGup said:

I feel you. Corporate companies are damaging to your mental health. Check out this website for non shit corp jobs 

https://www.techjobsforgood.com/

 

I've spent most of my time in large organizations. For me I have an increased appreciation of how much your manager matters. I still keep up with a good chunk of my past managers and some of my coworkers.

 

I honestly care less about "good" or "wokeness" and more about getting good stuff done and being well recognized. Also cold hard CASH. I want to be able to retire in my 30s.

[lounge-user]

21 minutes ago, cmndr said:

I've spent most of my time in large organizations. For me I have an increased appreciation of how much your manager matters. I still keep up with a good chunk of my past managers and some of my coworkers.

 

I honestly care less about "good" or "wokeness" and more about getting good stuff done and being well recognized. Also cold hard CASH. I want to be able to retire in my 30s.

Would google pourpously not hire a "straight white male" no matter if they show it indirectly or direcly, (e.g: to meet a race/ sexuallity quota, or out of prejudice/ racism)

[cmndr]

16 minutes ago, lounge-user said:

Would google pourpously not hire a "straight white male" no matter if they show it indirectly or direcly, (e.g: to meet a race/ sexuallity quota, or out of prejudice/ racism)

So compared to the general US population those are underrepresented (mainly due to the success of Asians) according to their diversity report (assuming you make a handful of assumptions about the distribution of ethnicity and sexuality). If you compare to the population of US STEM graduates at the top 30 or so universities, I suspect they're slightly underrepresented.

[lounge-user]

Just now, cmndr said:

So compared to the general US population those are overrepresented according to their diversity report (assuming you make a handful of assumptions about the distribution of ethnicity and sexuality). If you compare to the population of US STEM graduates at the top 30 or so universities, I suspect they're underrepresented.

Stepping away from race & "wokeness", are you satisfied with your life, do you think google helped you with that (e.g: providing information, a high salary & good benefits)

Do you think you should retire early and just enjoy life/ find a passion due to your high salary/ existing wealth.

 

Sorry if this is intrusive, I just want to grasp if big tech provides a fullfilling life.

[YellowJersey]

2 hours ago, dilpickle said:

I thought this thread was gonna be about you not using Google services anymore. That would have been even more dramatic.

Same. Funny thing is, I just stopped using google services. Moved my gmail over to protonmail, started using duckduckgo, and got a de-googled android phone, among other things.

[cmndr]

14 minutes ago, lounge-user said:

Stepping away from race & "wokeness", are you satisfied with your life, do you think google helped you with that (e.g: providing information, a high salary & good benefits)

Do you think you should retire early and just enjoy life/ find a passion due to your high salary/ existing wealth.

 

Sorry if this is intrusive, I just want to grasp if big tech provides a fullfilling life.

There are a lot of good things about working in such companies. If you can get in it's probably worth your time, just to get the experience. The majority of people you will run into are awesome. I'd say something similar about going to MIT or Harvard or Yale. A few need to get over themselves and to stop being so self-righteous. With that said the TEAM you land on absolutely matters. If you think your manager doesn't like you, start networking within the company and transfer sooner than later.

Also be aware that taxes eat into income more than most people think and that a 3 bedroom apartment will run around $5000/month in Silicon Valley. SV pay is something like 30% less than Austin pay because of taxes and living expense differences. I still have a few more years to work before I'd be semi-comfortable retiring and basically living like a college student for the rest of my life.


I'm fully aware that the culture that I grew up in will be gone someday. I can accept that. My parents will die one day. I'm a bit less fine with it being systematically exterminated. I am mildly bothered that some people are gleeful about it. A lot of the shift happened in just the last few years. 2010 is different from 2020.

[lounge-user]

Just now, cmndr said:

Also be aware that taxes eat into income more than most people think.

The cayman islands

Too bad tax avoidance is being slowly "deomolished"

I guess its not so bad if you think about where that money is going, apart from some rich guys pockets, it funds 100's of people of benefits, so thank you ig?

 

Quote

I'm fully aware that the culture that I grew up in is being systematically exterminated. I can accept that. My parents will die one day. I am mildly bothered that some people are gleeful about it.

Im not sure what you mean by this, im not trying to be rude or anything but I legitamately cannot understand what you mean, might be my error in competence lol

[cmndr]

3 minutes ago, lounge-user said:

Im not sure what you mean by this, im not trying to be rude or anything but I legitamately cannot understand what you mean, might be my error in competence lol

I did reword a little...

There's a systematic push to essentially recreate the culture of a liberal arts college but at a larger societal level. Not everyone values this. Even within progressive companies most people are a bit more moderate than the most outspoken (and often litigious) people.

[rikitikitavi]

2 hours ago, Commodus said:

I wouldn't consider Google's efforts at inclusion to be deal-breakers... that language, for instance? Google's clearly trying to walk on eggshells, but a lot of it is really easy to avoid. Don't use language that assumes a male-first world; don't treat people's traits (age, mental health, etc.) as negatives. Be considerate.

Language-wise (like from the list above) there is a big difference between communicating with respect and going overboard, like going full genderless nonsense with prohibiting words like guys, man-in-the-middle, etc.

[whm1974]

1 hour ago, rikitikitavi said:

Language-wise (like from the list above) there is a big difference between communicating with respect and going overboard, like going full genderless nonsense with prohibiting words like guys, man-in-the-middle, etc.

There really isn't any Genderless Language in English. In everyday speech and Writing it simply doesn't work. At best using it only looks like you have a "Basket Weaving" Degree. Much worse you came across as Brainwashed...

[cmndr]

1 hour ago, whm1974 said:

There really isn't any Genderless Language in English. In everyday speech and Writing it simply doesn't work. At best using it only looks like you have a "Basket Weaving" Degree. Much worse you came across as Brainwashed...

Some people ARE brainwashed, at least partially.

I've come across some smart people over the years. Think Stanford PhD in machine learning. They can repeat roughly what their lower div social science/humanities professors believed from years ago, but often they miss A LOT of context (e.g. criticizing British Imperialism and citing all sorts of evils pertaining to power imbalances impacting the distribution of resources but not really thinking about differences in technology, geography, etc. impacting how history has turned out [e.g. European imperialism VASTLY accelerated the end of international slavery and many revolts against it were for slavery]... and being largely ignorant/unaware of the Ottoman slave trade, ignorant of the martial nature of Roman culture which preceded more modern Christian mores, diminishing advances in genomics while citing that race is invalid because it's influenced by social constructs, etc.). I've had a lot of people say "wow I never heard that before" and I challenged them to fact check me.

It's really a case of superficial confidence (possibly overconfidence in the judgement and prejudices of past professors) and repeating what happens to be trendy. I'm just a nerd that likes A LOT of different areas of interest and who kept on learning even after grad school. The fashionability of certain view points seems to dominate social discourse more than accuracy or relevance unfortunately.

note - my debates/dialogs with a bunch of people outside of work has relatively little to do with this topic. This is more general social commentary about the professional/managerial class. If you want to get promotions at most hot companies ideally you're repeating the same fashionable things instead of aiming for dialectics.

[whm1974]

19 minutes ago, cmndr said:

Some people ARE brainwashed, at least partially.

I've come across some smart people over the years. Think Stanford PhD in machine learning. They can repeat roughly what their lower div social science/humanities professors believed from years ago, but often they miss A LOT of context (e.g. criticizing British Imperialism and citing all sorts of evils pertaining to power imbalances impacting the distribution of resources but not really thinking about differences in technology, geography, etc. impacting how history has turned out [e.g. European imperialism VASTLY accelerated the end of international slavery and many revolts against it were for slavery]... and being largely ignorant/unaware of the Ottoman slave trade, ignorant of the martial nature of Roman culture which preceded more modern Christian mores, diminishing advances in genomics while citing that race is invalid because it's influenced by social constructs, etc.). I've had a lot of people say "wow I never heard that before" and I challenged them to fact check me.

It's really a case of superficial confidence and repeating what happens to be trendy. I'm just a nerd that likes A LOT of different areas of interest and who kept on learning even after grad school. The fashionability of certain view points seems to dominate social discourse more than accuracy or relevance unfortunately.

note - my debates/dialogs with a bunch of people outside of work has relatively little to do with this topic. This is more general social commentary about the professional/managerial class. If you want to get promotions at most hot companies ideally you're repeating the same fashionable things instead of aiming for dialectics.

Slavery is as old as Human History. And it exist nearly everywhere. What finally end this was Technologically Development starting in the 19th Century that reduced the need for forced human labor. And Serfs I might add... 

[BuckGup]

23 hours ago, cmndr said:

I've spent most of my time in large organizations. For me I have an increased appreciation of how much your manager matters. I still keep up with a good chunk of my past managers and some of my coworkers.

 

I honestly care less about "good" or "wokeness" and more about getting good stuff done and being well recognized. Also cold hard CASH. I want to be able to retire in my 30s.

Damn you are tripping

[IkeaGnome]

21 minutes ago, BuckGup said:

Damn you are tripping

Curious about which part. The place I work is somewhat toxic. Good Ol' Boy system and all that. Long hours. Remote work. Long times away from families. The two crews I work with make it suck a lot less. The other two crews... I worked with them for a couple of weeks. No thanks. No fun there. I would have quit years ago.