MOST PEOPLE who work at Google are in SUPPORT roles!! And they are getting paid way less than industry standard for working 50, 60+ hours a week for it! Screw the free food, screw the laundry - the MAJORITY of people working at Google are in buildings without any of these amenities, and are certainly without extra money from stock options.
[…] they are the ones working their asses off, in overtime, but that doesn’t matter because they are salaried but way below industry standards for support positions, to make sure that YOU, the user, has an accessible Help Center, has a kind, email response, has an answer to your question.
Yes, there are foosball tables in the support buildings, but who has time to play them? Giant overhead projectors alerting them to the current turnaround time for their emails is Big Brother enough to ensure that they don’t even THINK about playing foosball when they should be answering support emails. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner are not nice alternatives - they are NECESSARY to ensure that all of the support peons remain dutiful and consistent with their email turnaround times.
Wow, sounds like they’re overworked. Can’t Google just hire more people? HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! For a response to that, please see the above comments. It’s as hard to get a support role here if you’re an MBA with a PhD as a hobby, as if you invented nuclear physics.
I’ve been here almost 5 years, and as soon as my refresher grant has vested, I am out like Lance Bass. It’s a load of corporate baloney - the 400-person company that I started at has become a nightmare that has eaten my soul. God help the users.
Wait a minute - I’m not one to employ the standard libertarian defense lightly, but c’mon! If these people are being payed below industry standard wages, why don’t they get a job somewhere else? You know, at those places that are above the industry average. Or is every company below average? What is keeping them at this horrible company that treats them so poorly?
Oh right, I forgot, Google is keeping them there against their will by turning them into infants. How clever!
posted by Mark
on February 19, 2007 #
Don’t doubt the power of golden handcuffs.
A lot of folks continue to put up with crappy jobs or crappy employers for a number of reasons. “I was lucky to get a job here. I can’t get a job anywhere else doing this”, “If I give up, I’ll be a failure. It can’t be as bad as I think”, or my personal favorite “When my stock vests, I’ll be rich”.
All of those are actually false, of course, but they’re just as effective as the proverbial gun to the head.
posted by jr
on February 19, 2007 #
Your About page says “fundamentally this blog is not for you, it’s for me.” What does this post do for you?
I ask because I agree with several comments on this blog, including in the thread you linked to, which claim that you’ve become concerned more with feeling that you understand something, rather than with truth itself; that when you come across ideas that appeal to you, you think “Aha! This is good,” and subconsciously add “the doubts and demands of profound investigation be damned.”
There’s no reason for you to care about these comments, especially this one, which is anonymous.
Still, this blog is for you, to help “shape yourself as an intellectual craftsman.”
A craftsman would, before posting, do the following: verify (or falsify) the claim that the majority of Google’s employees, or at least those in support roles, receive substandard compensation; and document the process through which it was verified (or falsified). A true craftsman would never be satisfied posting without at least that effort.
Verifying jr’s comment would require a more significant amount of work: you would need to conduct a representative series of interviews with underpaid employees at Google, in order to understand the reasons for which they don’t offer their resignation.
It’s too late to do this work before you post, but do it for yourself, anyway.
posted by umi
on February 20, 2007 #
The comment I posted above is not meant as a lecture, and I probably should just have emailed it to you. At any rate, I think it matters.
posted by umi
on February 20, 2007 #
support people don’t get stock options, but the OP is only hanging on until his vest… hmm…
support is a garbage job no matter where you work. at least google has free food. let the world know when you find the high-prestige, six figure help desk job of your dreams.
unfortunately, I now know at least half of those support people who work at google. where else would all those stanford graduates in linguistics/symbolic systems/cognitive science get jobs if google didn’t exist?
posted by stark fist of reality
on February 21, 2007 #
Most of corporate America (and the rest of the world too) is just a giant pyramid scheme, keeping the people at the top wealthy.
(with the freedom to start your own pyramid, of course)
Does anyone know how Google’s non-US offices work? I suspect the extent of employee perk generosity ends at the border. I don’t think anyone gets free meals at the Japanese office. (maybe free drinks, yay)
posted by Noraneko
on February 21, 2007 #
Seriously, what is your beef with Google? Several posts dedicated to complaining about the state of affairs at this company.
Additionally, any time you are confronted with criticism about your stance you seem to jump up on a high horse with comments such as “They offered me a job every time I visited their campus” or “They want to buy my company” and the like.
Relax man. Worry about your own company instead of theirs.
posted by Anonymous Coward
on February 27, 2007 #
Hey aaron,
I’m getting an internal server error message whenever I try to go to any reddit domain? What’s going on?
Reddit down? Could you post some updates for us as you guys are doing stuff.
posted by smacfarl
on March 1, 2007 #
Mark: Employers are monopsonists.
umi: I think you’re confusing me with Paul Graham. What part of “‘fringe-thoughts’: various ideas which may be byproducts of everyday life, snatches of conversation overheard in the street, or, for that matter, dreams […] may lead to more systematic thinking” did you not understand? What kind of person starts a research project before jotting a snatch of conversation they overheard?
Anonymous Coward: Only several posts? Google is one of the biggest local companies; a lot of my friends work there and many of the rest work in its shadow. I don’t think it’s unreasonable for me to think about that a bit.
I don’t jump on a high horse every time someone criticizes my stance — I’ve responded to a specific (but sadly common) ad hominem attack by pointing out that it was false. Perhaps I should have just pointed out it was ad hominem and kept my mouth shut, but since it was so popular I thought that pointing out it was false would probably be more effective. But apparently correcting people’s is now seen as getting emotionally agitated.
I don’t know what there is to relax about; I don’t even have a company.
smacfarl: I don’t work for reddit.
posted by Aaron Swartz
on March 1, 2007 #
umi: I think you’re confusing me with Paul Graham. What part of “‘fringe-thoughts’: various ideas which may be byproducts of everyday life, snatches of conversation overheard in the street, or, for that matter, dreams […] may lead to more systematic thinking” did you not understand? What kind of person starts a research project before jotting a snatch of conversation they overheard?
I suppose the kind of person who cares about the spirit of that quote. As well as the kind who believes honesty requires him to acknowledge the difference between a public indictment of another party, and a private record of thought.
However, I didn’t post in order to get a response from you. I said I think it matters. I can’t make it matter to you.
For what it’s worth, I found many of Graham’s essays fairly glib and intellectually lazy. I think he writes well but is, like you, happy to think until he comes to a conclusion that he likes, and from then on stop probing it too much.
posted by umi
on March 1, 2007 #
Are you ever wrong? or has anything posted in the comments to your blog ever caused you to reconsider a position?
I wouldn’t mind if every one of your posts was about google, but google is only about the fiftieth largest private employer in the bay area (many of which are tech companies). That is what I believe the other commenters are responding to, i.e. why all the hit pieces on google, why not on Apple, Cisco, HP, Oracle, Intel, Sun, etc? Are you implicitly indicating that you believe that working at any of the previous six companies would be better than working at google?
posted by chaz22
on March 1, 2007 #
With all due respect, Google’s support leaves much to be desired.
posted by Robert Lai
on March 11, 2007 #
/////Wow, sounds like they’re overworked. Can’t Google just hire more people? HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! For a response to that, please see the above comments. It’s as hard to get a support role here if you’re an MBA with a PhD as a hobby, as if you invented nuclear physics
What in essence is being said is that, extremely qualified, heavily screened support professionals are currently willing to work extremely hard for relatively lower pay by just to be a part of Google. While the anemities are just to make them less likely to leave the building.
And that Google does not see fit to hire other qualified support professionals because their standards are much too high - and would rather overwork their current staff at lower than industry standard pay as long as they are willing to put up with the situation.
And in essence, no one has complained to Google, and revealing blog posts are very very rare.
posted by Search Engines WEB
on March 11, 2007 #
You can also send comments by email.
Comments
Wait a minute - I’m not one to employ the standard libertarian defense lightly, but c’mon! If these people are being payed below industry standard wages, why don’t they get a job somewhere else? You know, at those places that are above the industry average. Or is every company below average? What is keeping them at this horrible company that treats them so poorly?
Oh right, I forgot, Google is keeping them there against their will by turning them into infants. How clever!
posted by Mark on February 19, 2007 #
Don’t doubt the power of golden handcuffs.
A lot of folks continue to put up with crappy jobs or crappy employers for a number of reasons. “I was lucky to get a job here. I can’t get a job anywhere else doing this”, “If I give up, I’ll be a failure. It can’t be as bad as I think”, or my personal favorite “When my stock vests, I’ll be rich”.
All of those are actually false, of course, but they’re just as effective as the proverbial gun to the head.
posted by jr on February 19, 2007 #
Your About page says “fundamentally this blog is not for you, it’s for me.” What does this post do for you?
I ask because I agree with several comments on this blog, including in the thread you linked to, which claim that you’ve become concerned more with feeling that you understand something, rather than with truth itself; that when you come across ideas that appeal to you, you think “Aha! This is good,” and subconsciously add “the doubts and demands of profound investigation be damned.”
There’s no reason for you to care about these comments, especially this one, which is anonymous.
Still, this blog is for you, to help “shape yourself as an intellectual craftsman.”
A craftsman would, before posting, do the following: verify (or falsify) the claim that the majority of Google’s employees, or at least those in support roles, receive substandard compensation; and document the process through which it was verified (or falsified). A true craftsman would never be satisfied posting without at least that effort.
Verifying jr’s comment would require a more significant amount of work: you would need to conduct a representative series of interviews with underpaid employees at Google, in order to understand the reasons for which they don’t offer their resignation.
It’s too late to do this work before you post, but do it for yourself, anyway.
posted by umi on February 20, 2007 #
The comment I posted above is not meant as a lecture, and I probably should just have emailed it to you. At any rate, I think it matters.
posted by umi on February 20, 2007 #
support people don’t get stock options, but the OP is only hanging on until his vest… hmm…
support is a garbage job no matter where you work. at least google has free food. let the world know when you find the high-prestige, six figure help desk job of your dreams.
unfortunately, I now know at least half of those support people who work at google. where else would all those stanford graduates in linguistics/symbolic systems/cognitive science get jobs if google didn’t exist?
posted by stark fist of reality on February 21, 2007 #
Most of corporate America (and the rest of the world too) is just a giant pyramid scheme, keeping the people at the top wealthy.
(with the freedom to start your own pyramid, of course)
Does anyone know how Google’s non-US offices work? I suspect the extent of employee perk generosity ends at the border. I don’t think anyone gets free meals at the Japanese office. (maybe free drinks, yay)
posted by Noraneko on February 21, 2007 #
Seriously, what is your beef with Google? Several posts dedicated to complaining about the state of affairs at this company.
Additionally, any time you are confronted with criticism about your stance you seem to jump up on a high horse with comments such as “They offered me a job every time I visited their campus” or “They want to buy my company” and the like.
Relax man. Worry about your own company instead of theirs.
posted by Anonymous Coward on February 27, 2007 #
Hey aaron,
I’m getting an internal server error message whenever I try to go to any reddit domain? What’s going on?
Reddit down? Could you post some updates for us as you guys are doing stuff.
posted by smacfarl on March 1, 2007 #
Mark: Employers are monopsonists.
umi: I think you’re confusing me with Paul Graham. What part of “‘fringe-thoughts’: various ideas which may be byproducts of everyday life, snatches of conversation overheard in the street, or, for that matter, dreams […] may lead to more systematic thinking” did you not understand? What kind of person starts a research project before jotting a snatch of conversation they overheard?
Anonymous Coward: Only several posts? Google is one of the biggest local companies; a lot of my friends work there and many of the rest work in its shadow. I don’t think it’s unreasonable for me to think about that a bit.
I don’t jump on a high horse every time someone criticizes my stance — I’ve responded to a specific (but sadly common) ad hominem attack by pointing out that it was false. Perhaps I should have just pointed out it was ad hominem and kept my mouth shut, but since it was so popular I thought that pointing out it was false would probably be more effective. But apparently correcting people’s is now seen as getting emotionally agitated.
I don’t know what there is to relax about; I don’t even have a company.
smacfarl: I don’t work for reddit.
posted by Aaron Swartz on March 1, 2007 #
I suppose the kind of person who cares about the spirit of that quote. As well as the kind who believes honesty requires him to acknowledge the difference between a public indictment of another party, and a private record of thought.
However, I didn’t post in order to get a response from you. I said I think it matters. I can’t make it matter to you.
For what it’s worth, I found many of Graham’s essays fairly glib and intellectually lazy. I think he writes well but is, like you, happy to think until he comes to a conclusion that he likes, and from then on stop probing it too much.
posted by umi on March 1, 2007 #
Are you ever wrong? or has anything posted in the comments to your blog ever caused you to reconsider a position?
I wouldn’t mind if every one of your posts was about google, but google is only about the fiftieth largest private employer in the bay area (many of which are tech companies). That is what I believe the other commenters are responding to, i.e. why all the hit pieces on google, why not on Apple, Cisco, HP, Oracle, Intel, Sun, etc? Are you implicitly indicating that you believe that working at any of the previous six companies would be better than working at google?
posted by chaz22 on March 1, 2007 #
With all due respect, Google’s support leaves much to be desired.
posted by Robert Lai on March 11, 2007 #
What in essence is being said is that, extremely qualified, heavily screened support professionals are currently willing to work extremely hard for relatively lower pay by just to be a part of Google. While the anemities are just to make them less likely to leave the building.
And that Google does not see fit to hire other qualified support professionals because their standards are much too high - and would rather overwork their current staff at lower than industry standard pay as long as they are willing to put up with the situation.
And in essence, no one has complained to Google, and revealing blog posts are very very rare.
posted by Search Engines WEB on March 11, 2007 #
You can also send comments by email.