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Xoogler here: I was promoted L5 -> L6 (senior -> staff SWE) in 2015, so I can talk a bit about this. Your manager can actually be helpful, but the process is b
by drewg123 8y ago
Xoogler here: I was promoted L5 -> L6 (senior -> staff SWE) in 2015, so I can talk a bit about this.
Your manager can actually be helpful, but the process is byzantine. In my case, my promo committee approved my promo. However, at L6 there was an automatic review of all promos to that level by a 2nd committee. The review committee denied my promo. My manager came in at this point and lodged an appeal on my behalf to the review committee's decision. That appeal took the promo to a 3rd committee that ultimately approved it.
I did not know any of the details of what was happening. I only learned what happened in my 1:1 with my manager when he told me the whole story. He was so happy and proud of himself that he managed to help me get promoted. The sad thing is that this was the 1:1 where I told him that I was leaving for Netflix (much better offer due to non-monetary factors).
The truly kafka-esque part of this: Since promo at Google is a huge deal, and since you if you are hired back, you retain the level at which you departed at, I really wanted to leave as a L6. So I delayed my start at Netflix until my promo went through. I resigned effective a day after the effective promo date. However, in the HR system, the resignation cancelled the promo. So I had to jump through some hoops to get the promo re-instated. I know it went through, because I had friends check go/epitaphs and I eventually got my promo jacket..
- wdr1 8y agoThe process has changed in significant ways since you left.
- asdfasgasdgasdg 8y agoNot all that much for ->L6 and above. Just for L5 and below.
- sowbug 8y agoYes, also for L6+ in ways that would have affected key parts of drewg123's experience.
- ptd 8y agoCare to elaborate?
- drewg123 8y agoI'm curious too.
- sowbug 8y agoI'm a current employee and subject to the confidentiality agreement, so I can't go into detail here. But you probably know as a former employee that Google often makes incremental improvements to their processes, and the promotion process (including L6+) is no exception. Sorry for the boring corporate-speak. If you really want to know the details, come back! :) (I realized after re-reading my comment that it was ambiguous; I didn't mean to suggest that your eventual yes would have turned into a no. I merely meant that the process to get there today would have been different, and hopefully more predictably efficient.) EDIT: actually there is one hugely confidential scoop that certainly would have affected you and that I'm totally going to share with you. They no longer have promotion jackets. (Readers, these were lightweight zippered jackets or pullovers that read "Google Engineering" near the breast-pocket area. They were so understated that they triggered this sort of CrossFit reflex that compelled some wearers to tell everyone within earshot about them.) In the past couple years the company has tried to tone down promotion celebrations, at least in Tech, so many of the broadcasted congratulations are gone, along with the jackets. Fine with me -- promotion season is nice for those who get what they asked for, painful for those who didn't, and in either case something that should be private by default, like your salary.
- tway2391426 8y agoInterestingly enough, the jackets also went away in 2016 in the latter half of the year, just before holiday gifts.
- ummonk 8y agoOuch. You did nothing wrong, but that must have sucked for your manager.
- sitkack 8y ago> However, in the HR system, the resignation cancelled the promo. Can I ask you about occurrences of fence post errors? There was a very important eng who was basically a sole contributor on a difficult component in a system. He announced his retirement date well in advance, but after the bonus payout period. HR terminated him early, denying him the bonus and leaving the team to scramble and organize a mini-summit to do knowledge transfer. The team itself had no control over the date. I believe it was a similar company.
- pkaye 8y agoI left my last company the day after our quarterly bonus and HR managed to reverse the transaction. To be honest I didn't even realize te bonus was due that day and I gave my usual 2 week notice. They could have not even deposited the amount and I would have not noticed. HR leadership used be a lot kinder at that company until there was a shift to a new HR director.
- tomerv 8y agoThat sounds illegal.
- vkou 8y agoIt doesn't matter if its illegal or not, if he wants to dispute it, it will probably go through binding arbitration. Arbitrators do not need to have any understanding of the law, and are notoriously employer-friendly.
- pkaye 8y agoPossibly but the amount lost was small and I had already gotten 98%+ of all my bonuses up to this point.
- joezydeco 8y agoGee, and in another thread we were wondering why people walk off jobs without notice. This is a prime example to reinforce the move.
- 8y ago
- curiousDog 8y agoAre you still at Netflix?
- drewg123 8y agoYes. It is by far the best place I've ever worked.
- philwelch 8y agoHow does the "only A players, adequate performance gets a big severance package" idea play out in reality? That seems like it would be a constant source of stress unless you were clearly in the top 10% even at Netflix.
- drewg123 8y agoIt sounds far, far worse than it is. This was a really big fear of mine going into the company almost 4 years ago, and so far I've been fine. I think it is a common fear that new hires have. Netflix is much faster to let people go (famous for no PIPs, etc). But I've never seen anybody shown the door with 0 warning.
- philwelch 8y agoThat's a little relieving; if anything, making the policy sound more brutal than it really is probably sets better expectations than making the policy sound more lenient than it really is. For example, as far as I can tell, the PIP ceremony is just that, a ceremony. Not that nobody has ever survived a PIP without getting fired, but it's typically a mechanism to manage people out while minimizing the company's liability. It's probably an improvement to replace an expensive, bureaucratic mechanism that keeps disgruntled low performers around with a lump sum of cash that gets them out the door ASAP (assuming the "generous severance" tradeoff is accurate). Also, every company talks a big game about setting a high bar and only wanting the best performers, so if you want to accurately convey the notion that you really do set a high bar and really do only want the best performers, you have to overstate the point to a degree that sounds brutal or even sociopathic.
- akdjflskd 8y agoCongrats! I have a couple questions if you don't mind: - Did Google give you a counter offer? - In what ways is Netflix better for you?
- drewg123 8y agoI did not leave for monetary reasons. Netflix offered me a few things that Google couldn't. I don't recall if there was a counter offer. I think there was talk of one, but I made it clear that it was not about money. At Netflix, I get to contribute to an open source project that I'm passionate about (and which Google does not use). Netflix is also much smaller, and I had more impact at Netflix in my first 2 months than I did in my entire time at Google. I should mention that Google was a fantastic place to work. I loved my co-workers, and I loved working for Google. Netflix just happened to be a much better fit for me.
- BeyondLimits99 8y agoThis was a great read. Thanks for sharing
- paulie_a 8y agoDamn that sounds insanely bureaucratic. I can't even imagine anyone would ever want to work there, it sounds like a shit show of stupidity. Even skipping the complicated and pointless interview process, if I were offered a million a year I'd say no.