3 ms·

What can Google do to fix those underlying issues?

by Joakal 16y ago

danbmil99 16y ago
Allow autonomy to product groups. They should be run like little startups: choose whatever tech stack they want, hire their own PM's, do their own hiring (Google recruiting is a complete wasteland), and live or die by their scucess/failure. It'll never happen, because it's diametrically opposed to the founding ideology, which is that every problem has a rational solution. Without getting too Ayn Rand on this, it's the classic mistake of central planning vs personal initiative.
- Hominem 16y ago
  Are you saying they should be able to go off into the wilderness, decide to run on Heroku or something and come back with an app? Companies invest huge sums of money on infrastructure and the expertise to manage it. Google has too big an infrastructure to let each project roll it's own. Let's say google reengineered to provide something like ec2,each team can run it's own images. does each group hire security experts? Does each group have to solve scaling problems google already faced? I think maybe it could work like this.Google proper hires domain experts, security, engineering etc. Provides each mini startup with a budget, mini startups can spend the cash on the Google proper experts, or go outside for areas where Google is lacking. Mini startup pays hosting fees to run on Google's EC2 like infrastructure, or use whatever Google has in place now.
  - waterlesscloud 16y ago
    What if you let teams select from internal security teams, internal scaling teams, etc? You can run a wide range of things on EC2, but I'd be willing to bet certain sets of things dominate. If the solution google has internally really is the best solution available, let it compete. It'll win until it's no longer the best.
    - cma 16y ago
      You'll get an internal 'Microsoft' who focuses on things like lock-in instead of quality, and other zero or negative-sum games like that. You'll need an internal patent and copyright system to keep one team from freeriding on another, etc. etc.
      - Hominem 16y ago
        Right, I don't have to implement a queuing system because a guy down the hall did it. But he sunk his budget into developing it and I get to swoop in and benefit. That is not a bad thing, that is how corporations are supposed to work, it would be worse if we burned two budgets implementing a queuing system, but it is a bit unfair that he burns his budget for my benefit. Maybe if I paid him "licensing" fees it would be more equitable, but then we have another porcupine to hug, managing all the internal licensing.
- horatiumocian 16y ago
  I remember reading at the beginning of the year that Google wants to change the way they are organized, in order to stop their employees who were frustrated with their bureaucracy from defecting to Facebook and other start-ups. A possible form would be similar to the advertising group/holdings, where each agency has a lot of autonomy. I think it's feasible to do that at Google if the infrastructure group would be spun off as a stand-alone entity (let's call it Google Ops) that can offer resources and consulting to any product group. When a new product is started, it would be similar to a start-up: 3 people in a room in the Googleplex who could choose to work with Google Ops, Amazon EC2, or something else. And Google would own a majority stake in this "start-up" and it would give them a certain budget (up to $1M - $10M).
- dagw 16y ago
  I've worked at places that worked a bit like this. The problem is that it leads to fierce competition between the groups to the detriment of the company as a whole. Groups will think nothing of costing the company $10 million if they can make $1 million, and stopping your nearest competitor group from making money is almost as good as making money yourself.
ajays 16y ago
From my experience in working at another large Internet company, my advice to Google would be: get rid of middle management. Get rid of the people who are not actually touching the product (in terms of code, design, testing, etc.). The impact of PMs is exponential in slowing down the processes in a company like Google (i.e. in the Internet space). Others may disagree (for example, established companies like Oracle may not fit this model); but I think if you're competing in the fast-paced "Web" world, you can't be slowed down by PMs. Good engineers are fairly self-driven. Hire people who work well in a team; make sure they get along well and just let them loose with minimal supervision. Have a decent set of guidelines in place; make an "architect" available to them who they can call on for advice and "best practices". I am reminded of this old article: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/28/ge.html http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/28/ge.html It's definitely worth a read.

What can Google do to fix those underlying issues?

by Joakal 16y ago

What can Google do to fix those underlying issues?

Allow autonomy to product groups. They should be run like little startups: choose whatever tech stack they want, hire their own PM's, do their own hiring (Google recruiting is a complete wasteland), and live or die by their scucess/failure. It'll never happen, because it's diametrically opposed to the founding ideology, which is that every problem has a rational solution. Without getting too Ayn Rand on this, it's the classic mistake of central planning vs personal initiative.

Hominem 16y ago
Are you saying they should be able to go off into the wilderness, decide to run on Heroku or something and come back with an app? Companies invest huge sums of money on infrastructure and the expertise to manage it. Google has too big an infrastructure to let each project roll it's own. Let's say google reengineered to provide something like ec2,each team can run it's own images. does each group hire security experts? Does each group have to solve scaling problems google already faced? I think maybe it could work like this.Google proper hires domain experts, security, engineering etc. Provides each mini startup with a budget, mini startups can spend the cash on the Google proper experts, or go outside for areas where Google is lacking. Mini startup pays hosting fees to run on Google's EC2 like infrastructure, or use whatever Google has in place now.
- waterlesscloud 16y ago
  What if you let teams select from internal security teams, internal scaling teams, etc? You can run a wide range of things on EC2, but I'd be willing to bet certain sets of things dominate. If the solution google has internally really is the best solution available, let it compete. It'll win until it's no longer the best.
  - cma 16y ago
    You'll get an internal 'Microsoft' who focuses on things like lock-in instead of quality, and other zero or negative-sum games like that. You'll need an internal patent and copyright system to keep one team from freeriding on another, etc. etc.
    - Hominem 16y ago
      Right, I don't have to implement a queuing system because a guy down the hall did it. But he sunk his budget into developing it and I get to swoop in and benefit. That is not a bad thing, that is how corporations are supposed to work, it would be worse if we burned two budgets implementing a queuing system, but it is a bit unfair that he burns his budget for my benefit. Maybe if I paid him "licensing" fees it would be more equitable, but then we have another porcupine to hug, managing all the internal licensing.
horatiumocian 16y ago
I remember reading at the beginning of the year that Google wants to change the way they are organized, in order to stop their employees who were frustrated with their bureaucracy from defecting to Facebook and other start-ups. A possible form would be similar to the advertising group/holdings, where each agency has a lot of autonomy. I think it's feasible to do that at Google if the infrastructure group would be spun off as a stand-alone entity (let's call it Google Ops) that can offer resources and consulting to any product group. When a new product is started, it would be similar to a start-up: 3 people in a room in the Googleplex who could choose to work with Google Ops, Amazon EC2, or something else. And Google would own a majority stake in this "start-up" and it would give them a certain budget (up to $1M - $10M).
dagw 16y ago
I've worked at places that worked a bit like this. The problem is that it leads to fierce competition between the groups to the detriment of the company as a whole. Groups will think nothing of costing the company $10 million if they can make $1 million, and stopping your nearest competitor group from making money is almost as good as making money yourself.

ajays 16y ago

From my experience in working at another large Internet company, my advice to Google would be: get rid of middle management. Get rid of the people who are not actually touching the product (in terms of code, design, testing, etc.). The impact of PMs is exponential in slowing down the processes in a company like Google (i.e. in the Internet space). Others may disagree (for example, established companies like Oracle may not fit this model); but I think if you're competing in the fast-paced "Web" world, you can't be slowed down by PMs. Good engineers are fairly self-driven. Hire people who work well in a team; make sure they get along well and just let them loose with minimal supervision. Have a decent set of guidelines in place; make an "architect" available to them who they can call on for advice and "best practices". I am reminded of this old article: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/28/ge.html http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/28/ge.html It's definitely worth a read.