6 ms·

Elephant in the room or exception that proves the rule? I would also consider Doerr as starting his career at Intel (back when it didn't have a virtual monopol

Elephant in the room or exception that proves the rule? I would also consider Doerr as starting his career at Intel (back when it didn't have a virtual monopoly) rather than being a senior leader. I think these one-trick ponies are good places to start careers, I just think the market should be more wary when hiring exec leadership (VP to c-level) from them.

argonaut 10y ago
Sure Google and Intel don't have great executives that leave for other companies, if you exclude the really successful ones. /s It's also incredibly rare for executives to leave these companies in the first place. They are compensated wildly; if they leave, it's usually to retire.
- elgabogringo 10y ago
  not sure why you feel the need to be sarcastic about this. Marissa and Armstrong were big names coming out of Google that many would argue flamed out. The fact that Sheryl Sandberg makes what I would consider is a lateral move to another successful company doesn't really come into play. I'd rather hire the leader from a company with a diverse set of products that was directly accountable for an independent P&L. You don't really get that at Intel as everything is a derivative of x86 and I don't think you get that very much at Google (where the real P&L that matters is still search advertising.) I can speak specifically to Intel, that execs increasingly don't leave because they lack the necessary experience to go run an independent business. Sometimes they manage to get hired elsewhere and, in most cases, they flame out and either retire or return.
  - argonaut 10y ago
    Because your logic is obviously fallacious (e.g. moving the goalposts / excluding contrary evidence).
eldavido 10y ago
There's a much bigger insight here. High-flying companies in SV have become another form of cover-your-ass pedigree that allows the entire management chain to pass the buck on hiring decisions. I see this at the lowest level from IC engineering hires up to the CEO. Hiring someone/investing in their company/putting them in any position of trust, after they've been "minted" at the successful big company is "safe"; it hardly matters what the person did, or what results they achieved, just that it's "on their resume". Whereas hiring someone from a scrappy startup that worked their ass off and executed but wasn't in a position to influence strategy will be branded a "loser" and in a much worse position to get hired vs. the safe bigco candidate. This is really a big problem/opportunity, and it's all down to our inability to measure/attribute individual performance in a team setting. But it does make you wonder, from a career-planning perspective, should I optimize for "name" or actual learning? Should we all follow Sandberg's advice and just "Get on a rocket ship" and "let our careers take care of themselves" even if the company is already on a breakout trajectory before we got there? As someone who's spent a lot of time optimizing for actual learning, I'm starting to think it's the losing strategy, but then, all my friends work for big companies like Apple / facebook / google, so maybe their influence is just rubbing off on me.
- elgabogringo 10y ago
  Very true. Like buying from IBM will never get you fired, neither would hiring from Google (though they may start to change in their case.) Certainly it's easier to look at education, corporate brand as signaling than to really dive into someone's skills and capacity to be successful.
  - eldavido 10y ago
    The worst thing is that I see myself falling into this trap. I get dismissive of people without the right "pedigree", but then I realize it's the worst form of mental laziness. I wonder whether truly great companies are different. I think that, just like really great investors (Fred Wilson and Michael Seibel, to name two) have said, "just tell me what you're doing in simple language", implicitly saying "I trust my own judgment" (vs. some elaborate dance of social networking/signaling), I suspect hiring at really top-tier companies doesn't turn as much on pedigree as on some measurable element of skill, or actual work performance. In any case, the people I admire most in this world are the contrarians who have the conviction to act on their beliefs, like the Big Short guys, or Billy Beane from the A's -- but that kind of thinking isn't career-friendly, AT ALL. I also think Nassim Taleb has the right idea that "skin in the game is a moral imperative". In all cases where people pass the buck, the problem is that their interests (e.g. their own careers) are insufficiently aligned with those of their principals (the firms' investors). You want to really see what works, look at the guys who are playing with their own money (e.g. hedge funds, proprietary traders, closely-held companies), not the pundits on CNN.
trimbo 10y ago
Mike Markkula was mid level manager at Intel (and Fairchild)

argonaut 10y ago

Sure Google and Intel don't have great executives that leave for other companies, if you exclude the really successful ones. /s It's also incredibly rare for executives to leave these companies in the first place. They are compensated wildly; if they leave, it's usually to retire.

elgabogringo 10y ago
not sure why you feel the need to be sarcastic about this. Marissa and Armstrong were big names coming out of Google that many would argue flamed out. The fact that Sheryl Sandberg makes what I would consider is a lateral move to another successful company doesn't really come into play. I'd rather hire the leader from a company with a diverse set of products that was directly accountable for an independent P&L. You don't really get that at Intel as everything is a derivative of x86 and I don't think you get that very much at Google (where the real P&L that matters is still search advertising.) I can speak specifically to Intel, that execs increasingly don't leave because they lack the necessary experience to go run an independent business. Sometimes they manage to get hired elsewhere and, in most cases, they flame out and either retire or return.
- argonaut 10y ago
  Because your logic is obviously fallacious (e.g. moving the goalposts / excluding contrary evidence).

eldavido 10y ago

There's a much bigger insight here. High-flying companies in SV have become another form of cover-your-ass pedigree that allows the entire management chain to pass the buck on hiring decisions. I see this at the lowest level from IC engineering hires up to the CEO. Hiring someone/investing in their company/putting them in any position of trust, after they've been "minted" at the successful big company is "safe"; it hardly matters what the person did, or what results they achieved, just that it's "on their resume". Whereas hiring someone from a scrappy startup that worked their ass off and executed but wasn't in a position to influence strategy will be branded a "loser" and in a much worse position to get hired vs. the safe bigco candidate. This is really a big problem/opportunity, and it's all down to our inability to measure/attribute individual performance in a team setting. But it does make you wonder, from a career-planning perspective, should I optimize for "name" or actual learning? Should we all follow Sandberg's advice and just "Get on a rocket ship" and "let our careers take care of themselves" even if the company is already on a breakout trajectory before we got there? As someone who's spent a lot of time optimizing for actual learning, I'm starting to think it's the losing strategy, but then, all my friends work for big companies like Apple / facebook / google, so maybe their influence is just rubbing off on me.

elgabogringo 10y ago
Very true. Like buying from IBM will never get you fired, neither would hiring from Google (though they may start to change in their case.) Certainly it's easier to look at education, corporate brand as signaling than to really dive into someone's skills and capacity to be successful.
- eldavido 10y ago
  The worst thing is that I see myself falling into this trap. I get dismissive of people without the right "pedigree", but then I realize it's the worst form of mental laziness. I wonder whether truly great companies are different. I think that, just like really great investors (Fred Wilson and Michael Seibel, to name two) have said, "just tell me what you're doing in simple language", implicitly saying "I trust my own judgment" (vs. some elaborate dance of social networking/signaling), I suspect hiring at really top-tier companies doesn't turn as much on pedigree as on some measurable element of skill, or actual work performance. In any case, the people I admire most in this world are the contrarians who have the conviction to act on their beliefs, like the Big Short guys, or Billy Beane from the A's -- but that kind of thinking isn't career-friendly, AT ALL. I also think Nassim Taleb has the right idea that "skin in the game is a moral imperative". In all cases where people pass the buck, the problem is that their interests (e.g. their own careers) are insufficiently aligned with those of their principals (the firms' investors). You want to really see what works, look at the guys who are playing with their own money (e.g. hedge funds, proprietary traders, closely-held companies), not the pundits on CNN.

trimbo 10y ago

Mike Markkula was mid level manager at Intel (and Fairchild)