Confessions of a cat

Reading an old colleague’s blog recently I realized - again - that working for big companies usually sucks.

He rants a bit about google (in hungarian, so sorry, no link here), and points to this techcrunch article: why google employees quit.

Even though I like what google does with its google gears and recent app engine tools - I think that amongst the 18,000 (as of 2008, Feb., maybe more maybe less now) “googlers” there must be quite a few who feel that they are just a minuscule tiny bit of a cog in that giant whale called google. A hiring process that takes 3-5 months from sending in your resume to your first work day. Ridiculous. Low pay compared to what others for the same level of skills are offering. Eh, cheapo.

”People don’t work at Google for the money.
They work at Google because they want to change the world!”
                                             - Eric Schmidt, Google 

The problem with google in my opinion is that it is not a small (mid.) startup anymore. This alone explains everything. If you want to innovate or create something ‘new’ starting your own company is the best you can do. For yourself. Do it. Do it now. The bigger a company, the less capacity it has to keep and recruit the same-like people. There’s need to expand, to hire more, and eventually it all starts to suck somewhere along the way.

Well of course you can’t just work for the money. Even if I am aware of the fact that 80% of the population in the whole world works at the place where they are now because they need to pay the bills - and not because what they do is particularly interesting to them. Once you find what you love to do, and you have motive, and can overcome all the obstacles (multiple/multitudes of layers of management - anyone?) money is second. Of course it is needed but you should not be thinking on it, and of course you should be paid enough for your work if you feel you deserve it. If not - get out or better yet: do not even get in :).

Also people should not be (micro-)managed all the time. There’s no need for levels of levels of levels… of management. Most of them do nothing anyway.

Just as Google can be a great place for the software engineer to do great work unencumbered, it’s also possible for a manger to be a complete jerk unencumbered.

                - “Ted” from the TechCrunch article

Well I’ll leave it up to you to decide. I have never worked for google (and have no plans to do so), but I do have my 5 year experience with idiots. Also after a certain amount of time things start to suck everywhere - that’s why you need a change.