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Comment by cj | Hacker News Reader

In the context of starting a job at Google, I highly doubt you sign your employment contracts the day you show up for work.

Typically employment contracts are signed and settled well before you enter the building as an employee.

I would be surprised if the OP’s anecdote regarding the Googler pulled on the 1st day is in line with reality.

Edit: apparently I’m wrong, the downvotes were deserved! I run hiring at my company and we send people all contracts at the same time that we send the offer letter. No surprise paperwork on Day 1. I’m surprised to hear other companies wait until the start date to sort out legal

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I was hired right out of school by Google in 2007. I was absolutely presented with various contract documents on day 1 to sign. In fact, I was not even given paper copies of them; I was supposed to click my agreement in an intranet signing tool.

(I couldn't say what fraction of my employment paperwork was handled in this way, but things like IP assignment were definitely included.)

At one of my first jobs, one of the things I had to agree to was having read "the employee handbook".. but it was not a pdf or other document, it was part of an internal wiki or something, with in-links and out-links all over the place.

I don't recall if I tried to figure out whether the strongly connected component that comprised the handbook was the same as "all pages on the wiki", but I was a little distressed at the time (this being one of my first jobs) that I was being asked to sign my name on something that I couldn't realistically read.

There's always a price to pay for all the innovation that happens in SV. It's just that it ends up being paid by the people rather than by the companies. Companies can afford to pay for the most exclusive of bodyguards, the government.

That’s quite reminiscent of the user experience Google’s customers go through with the TOS

When I was hired by Google in 2010, I was sent physical papers to sign and return. I distinctly remember this because Google mailedthe papers to my old address from my first application rather than my 2010 address so I had to drive to my family member's house to get papers on a Friday and send them back by Monday.

I still have email copies of the contracts which they sent in parallel. This includes General Hiring Contract & Salary and a standard NDA with California Section 2870 modification.

The only paperwork I saw in 2014 before my first day was an offer letter (no contract per se; CA is an at-will state), NDA, relocation offer (always ask for one; it's rarely offered) and a list to fill out of prior inventions. The rest does get signed in noogler orientation.

The benefits (to Google) of being a giant company with at-will employment.

That's pretty normal, at least in tech in CA. Every job I've taken in the past 15 years has had documents I was required to sign on my first day as a condition of starting employment. Most also had some other documents I had to sign to accept the offer, but those were not comprehensive.

It is pretty normal in SV to not see your actual contract before you start. I think I have only ever signed one ahead of time, and that was an unusual situation in other ways.

(Normal, not right. And I started working here in the early 90s.)

This does happen regularly, and employees should never do it (for precisely this reason).

Don't quit your job, move cities, etc etc without a signed contract.

What good is that if you're an "at-will" employee? They can just change the rules at any time for any reason and fire you if you don't agree to them.

I have enough experience to know absolutely nothing about me employer is guaranteed/permanent in the US.

Relevant story for the HN crowd: I worked for a small company (~250 employees). Real chill place. Six months after I start they were suddenly bought out by a huge multinational corporation. First order of business is everyone needs to sign a non-disclosure agreement and an agreement that the company owns all the code you write while employed with them, even if you do it on your own time. There were some people who were reluctant to sign, it was made extremely clear that if they didn't sign they would be unemployed.

That one didn't bother me, I only code at work anyway. What did bother me was at another employer right after I became eligible for the employer's (generous) match on my 401(k) (after 1 year employment) an email went out a few weeks later saying "Sorry, we won't be matching 401k contributions anymore."

I know a guy (very senior engineer) who negotiated that he would be working from home 3-4 days a week before taking a new job. Employer agreed. Few months later line manager notices that employee is not logged into whatever work chat they use in the middle of the day. Not habitually, once. Next day it was announced that there will be no more working from home.

I mean, I completely agree with you. As a non-American, the concept of "at-will" employment is utterly bizarre to me.

But, as a matter of practicality, it's less likely that, after you've signed your contract, Google comes to you on your first day and says "I'm altering the terms of our deal, pray I don't alter it further".

This is all mostly about managing unexpected risks, and my point is that it's actually pretty common for contracts to contain/omit clauses that you really take issue with. I'm just saying it's prudent to know what you're getting yourself into before you up stakes and move cities.

>But, as a matter of practicality, it's less likely that, after you've signed your contract, Google comes to you on your first day and says "I'm altering the terms of our deal, pray I don't alter it further".

It's been my experience that benefits change very regularly, sometimes significantly. For example, my current employer updates their compensation plan every year at the very least.

It's been my experience whenever the company I worked for ends up in a position where they are financially strapped benefits and work conditions change suddenly, drastically, and very frequently.

If you don't work for a big company (or even if you do) there is a good chance where you work will be acquired if you work somewhere long enough and that changes everything. I know some people I used to work with who experienced 4 acquisitions at the same job.

I would assume that if they do decide to "change the rules" then the penalty clauses in the contract kick in, such as payment in lieu of notice. Jesusland does actually enforce contracts, right?

> the penalty clauses in the contract kick in, such as payment in lieu of notice

Penalty clauses in a non-union job in the US!??? How on earth does one get such a clause?

I've had five software jobs and four non-skilled jobs and never seen anything even approaching this sort of clause in an employment agreement, or heard of anyone ever having this sort of clause in their employment agreement, unless you're talking about like CEOs.

The only employment agreements and/or offer letters I've ever seen (from both myself and my spouse) were more-or-less "here's your starting salary and you are employed at will." In fact, the last offer letter I signed literally said something along the lines of "this offer letter is not an employment contract or a guarantee of continued employment."

I'd love to see/read these mythical supposedly "contracts" sometime to see the exact verbage. I very seriously doubt that one just gets to walk away with a big payday just because their employee changed the benefits plan. Not in the US.

Where is "Jesusland"? (I'm from a small, deep blue, Acela corridor state that the current President-elect hails from, so pardon me for not knowing where this place is located).

Likely they're referring to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesusland_map

Well, if "Jesusland" = red state USA, it seems to me the blue states have exactly the same kinds of employment contracts.

As one of the people who gave a counterexample, let me just say that I don't support people downvoting you, and I would much rather live in your reality than this one. (Thank you for treating your employees better than most.)

(Not Google) My first job out of college I was asked to sign quite a bit of paperwork on my first day, after I had relocated to their city.

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