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Comment by bryanrasmussen | Hacker News Reader

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Every year, Google receives over one million resumes and applications. Only 4,000-6000 applicants will actually be hired — that's less than a 1% hiring rate.

Given those odds it's not worth it.

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These numbers are misleading af. Most of those applications are just spam, not really relevant and never get read by any human. I’ve done ~150 interviews for backend roles at google and based on my experience 4 years ago if you make it to onsite you have 5-10% of getting an offer

You've been interviewed 150 times to get in? Or are in and have interviewed 150 candidates?

Yes

That confirms that we shouldn't bother if we value our time and energy.

Many people apply to all the FANGS, since the interviewing skillset needed is similar. Moreover, you can reapply every six months. In result, this gives you perhaps 5-10 lottery tickets every year, which means it's very feasible to get in within a year or two (or three).

In other words - don't bother to apply if you actually need a job. And if you have a job already, why would you bother to apply there? It used to be attractive but is it still? With all the scandals and upheaval in the recent years?

The reason is that it doubles or triples regular SWE salary.

Eh, I've had two offers from Google that were far below the "market rate" I was receiving at some of the largest pre-IPO unicorns of the last decade, and their interview processes were substantially better.

"pre-IPO unicorn" is the same rarified air. We're comparing to average paying jobs most people have.

>And if you have a job already, why would you bother to apply there? It used to be attractive but is it still? With all the scandals and upheaval in the recent years?

$$$

Going through 5 companies hoops for 2-3 years sounds like a full time job. There's no way I would have time to do that on top of work right now.

What if doing so could double or triple your salary? Would that change the calculus?

It doesn't change the number of hours in my day, so unlikely.

But it could cut down on the number of days you have to work before retiring.

For what it's worth I probably wouldn't want to move to SF and take a FAANG job either, but I can see why many people would

>Moreover, you can reapply every six months. In result, this gives you perhaps 5-10 lottery tickets every year,

you are aware of the saying that the lottery is a tax on stupidity?

I guess that is perhaps a little harsh, but only a little.

First off, I don't think I would want to work at any place where getting in there is represented as winning a lottery ticket. Think of the poor oompa-loompas enslaved in Willy Wonka's factory.

Second off, perhaps it's just my vantage as a consultant in Denmark but everything I've read about working in Google has made me think it doesn't seem very enticing.

Third off, even when I was not married with kids I would not have wanted to spend so much time twice a year! How many unpaid hours a year are people willing to work for a lottery ticket that essentially pays out a top-paying job?

Do you understand the difference between spending money on a negative expected value lottery, and spending time developing your knowledge skills?

Almost everything in life is "lottery ticket" with some odds.

I think i may have given the impression that it’s 10% by pure chance which it most def isn’t. There’s certainly some randomness in the system but if someone is in the bottom 50% by skill they can probably apply like 100 times and still fail every single one.

So the top range is 10% chance of getting an offer? And how many hours do you have to spend chasing 10%?

Somewhere between 0 and infinity? I asked extremely simple questions algorithmically (not anything posted online) and didn’t discount candidates on not knowing the algorithm but about half of the people couldn’t write ~20 lines of code after we’d already talked through it. Another 30% could but the code was total mess. I passed roughly 20% personally of which about half passed the hiring committee.

if you get onsite at most companies for an experienced position the chance is rather 50% to get hired. if i would know the chance is only 5 % i would decline the onsite interview at google.

From my experience 50% couldn’t write code at all. So yeah if you only look for “can code” checkbox then you’d probably extend offers to half. Google chose to place the bar higher and that’s their right to do that

It’s true, and the end result is you probably consider 90-95% of the people you interview to be morons right?

> if you make it to onsite

So those numbers are accurate and not misleading.

Sure but I never applied...they reached out to me. Hence why I didn't read their materials to interview. I've been happily employed the entire time.

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