Hacker News Reader

Comment by msoad | Hacker News Reader

I worked at Google. This makes me sad. Sad to see people are treating a for profit company like a religion. Google is a good workplace compared to other companies but it's not a religion and it's not perfect. As other commenters said it's not the thing it was before either.

I left Google to work on something more interesting and I can't be happier. If we're going to hire people, I'm not putting any weight on their work background.

View on HN

It reminds me of graduates who want to get into investment banking. They have a ranking in their head of which bank is better than which other, and make a massive deal out of getting into #2 instead of #1 or #3. The reality is that down to #10, they will likely get a very similar experience and chances are they will have gone through 2 or 3 of those banks on their list anyway by the time they are 30.

And at the end of the day, what makes most of your experience is the team you work with rather than which of the 50,000+ employees organisations employs you.

By all accounts, both big tech companies and big investment banks are good places to be, with some variance per team.

There is signalling content associated with being at the number 1 bank (and a top group within that bank for that matter; e.g., the financial institutions group at Goldman Sachs). If you planned on staying at an investment bank for your whole career then this might not be so important. The majority of people who start these jobs hope very much to jump ship as soon as possible to work on the buy side (hedge fund or private equity), and in that regard the signalling content is very important because there are so many good candidates for any available spots.

People spend years at medical school or law school to become a doctor or lawyer. I don't see the big deal at devoting a huge amount of concentrated time and effort to being an engineer at Google. If you got the free time and willpower (and the author does), more power to you.

If he doesn't get the job, he's still got the knowledge. And 8 months is nothing compared to multiple years in college.

> People spend years at medical school or law school to become a doctor or lawyer.

True, but both of those are professions. Qualifications that you carry irrespective of your employer. Being 'a Google engineer' is not the same thing, although people might like to imagine it is.

What is it then?

I think what he is getting at is while being an 'Engineer' definitely is (a profession), a 'Google Engineer' is not.

According to the Department of Labor, a Google engineering job qualifies as professional and therefore exempt from overtime pay.

The med school and law school knowledge is equally applicable to any med or law career, because you are studying for a certification exam that is independent of employer. Even if you choose to employ yourself (private practice), you'll have to pass those exams.

The Google study emphasizes what Google tests for, not what you need for the profession. If you start your own software company, for example, is the Google material critically important?

> The Google study emphasizes what Google tests for, not what you need for the profession.

While it's applicability to actual software development is debatable, the Google interview is not substantially different from other top tech company interviews.

I'm sure the author will be well-served with this knowledge even if they don't end up working at Google. There are dozens of other companies which will test the same knowledge (and also pay well).

The IB comparison is apt. People routinely study extensively and run a gauntlet to get a job at an investment bank, and that preparation is generally applicable to multiple different banks.

I'm not sure you read the article. In it explains he went overboard, a lot of it wasn't needed for the interviews & narrows down his recommendation to ~3 books.

What are you talking about? Where in this article does the author treat Google like a religion? He specifically said it wouldn't be the end of the world if he didn't make it. He specifically said others shouldn't study that much.

Another comment based on the headline and not reading the article? Bet you'll get those anti-google upvotes anyway.

What about: "The more I learn about Google, the more I want to work there. In brief, Google is a company that [...] gives employees the freedom to make good decisions for the user. [...] Nowadays candidates are chosen based on coding ability, technical knowledge, and Googleyness."

As a user, it hasn't been my experience in a long while that Google gives employees the freedom to make good decisions for the user. Google Plus wasn't about users. The shutdown of Google Reader, or of countless other products that had a strong following, weren't to please or help users.

And what's "Googleyness" if not a religious feature?

None of that approaches religiosity. Your ridiculous interpretation is colored by your preexisting opinions about Google.

Your logic also fails you. Developers having the freedom to do what's right for the user doesn't imply they succeed.

All I see here are a lot of personal attacks. Feel free to explain what your definition of "religiosity" is and why it doesn't apply to what Bambax quoted.

I asked which part is religious. Bambax quoted some non-religious things. Why would it be on me to prove everything he/she says is not something it obviously isn't?

Also, which attack is personal? I'm attacking an interpretation. Nothing personal about it.

Ok, so what is Googleyness?

When you ridicule any aspect of a person (such as their interpretation of "religiosity"), it's a personal attack. Look up the definition of "personal". Oh, and yes: calling someone's interpretation of "religiosity" "ridiculous" is literally ridiculing said personal interpretation.

Btw, I noticed that you still haven't provided your own definition of "religiosity". Are you worried that someone else might ridicule that as well?

> gives employees the freedom to make good decisions for the user

Not nearly true in any 'Data Driven' company...this dude has no idea who is arbitrating decisions in any reasonable size company...

Personally the Googleyness thing is the most cult-like aspect of Google by far.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com