4 ms·

I honestly don't understand what "bureaucratic error" means in this context. Does it imply office politics? Surely even Google won't let a top engineer leave d

I honestly don't understand what "bureaucratic error" means in this context. Does it imply office politics? Surely even Google won't let a top engineer leave due to purely administrative issues.

girvo 5y ago
> Surely even Google I think it's _more_ likely to happen at a company the scale of Google, frankly.
- thrdbndndn 5y ago
  That's what I meant? "Even XX won't" means while XX is more likely to do YY, it shouldn't get to this degree.
  - girvo 5y ago
    I must be misunderstanding I'm afraid. From my perspective, it's incredibly unsurprising that a company as large as Google and run the way Google is would let a top engineer leave due to administrative issues
high_derivative 5y ago
As a FAANG employee, the way this typically happens is this: There is some sort of team reshuffle, someone moving to a new project and so on. Another team agrees to take on a high level IC (I assume this guy was at least L8-9). At that level, this move is approved by a VP. Person moves, headcount is filled/removed at his old team. Then new VP decides he is not ok with some part of the working arrangement (e.g. remote, scope). Person is now given a few weeks to find a few project/team, but most teams cannot accommodate senior ICs at that level easily. Boom, out of a job. Basically VP backroom dealings. It's just 'bureaucracy', and seniority almost does not matter. The only way to stop it at that point would be calling other VPs or SVPs for favours. In fact, seniority works against you here, because it becomes more political, while nobody cares about a low level IC switching around, and almost any org can absorb a solid L5 contributor.
- thrdbndndn 5y ago
  Thanks, that makes sense. I never worked in software engineering industry or in a big enough company that has internal "teams" organized this way.
  - reducesuffering 5y ago
    OP alludes to it coinciding with leaving California. And since OP's leaving California post is in February, while indicating he left Google last month, it's possible it was some sort of remote-work snafu.
    - DoreenMichele 5y ago
      He essentially says as much: ...my move away from California led to the end of my career there.
- vl 5y ago
  This is even a problem (for many people surprisingly) at L6: you have your specialization, and very few directors will agree to get L6 with unmatching specialization. But there could be only so many Android projects, or iPhone projects, or ML at any given site. So if you try to change teams, you quickly learn that there are just couple potential positions for you.
  - ozzythecat 5y ago
    This is almost certainly not a problem at every FANG company. I’m at Amazon now and heads down in interviews. I work with a few different teams on both mobile apps and services. I don’t particularly care for specialization and I know as a company we’re looking for engineers across the board. If you can code, you’ll be smart enough to ramp up on whatever stack a team is working on.
  - neilv 5y ago
    Is this due to how budgets are allocated to teams? Or something else?
vl 5y ago
Google is notoriously stupid about remote work. While bunch of people did it under the rag or by special arrangements, default policy was “no”. They run infamous “defrags” by trying consolidating projects in fewer location in process fucking up teams, products and making people leave. Anyway, here probably HR got a sniff of employee relocating, and while they emailed back-and-forth arguing, it pissed him enough that he decided to bug out. Or maybe some manager used this as opportunity to skillfully kick him out presenting it on the outside as “error”.
- ghaff 5y ago
  Some variant on this seems likely. I know someone who is something of an industry name and he got hired at Google. His working remotely was tolerated--until it wasn't and he ended up leaving. It certainly sounds as if OP moving to Portland was the proximate issue which he either couldn't resolve or he just decided that he couldn't be bothered to seriously try to resolve it. There are times when you're half ready to move on and a bump in the road can be all it takes.
psyc 5y ago
I really wish he’d explained, because I can’t figure out how that could happen and not be trivial to fix. I have no idea what goes on in Google, but I worked at Microsoft HQ for many years. Sure, it’s overwhelmingly gargantuan in many ways, but if I got ‘accidentally fired’ the most likely thing is my manager would find out about it and fix it before I even found out. In the event that it fell on me to act, I could stroll down the hall to my manager, my skip level, or the general manager. And if the GM didn’t want me gone, somebody above them (and that does not include HR) would have to positively want me gone, or it wouldn’t happen. Perhaps this person actually wanted to leave, and so decided it was like a sign that it was a good time to go.
- reducesuffering 5y ago
  It's possible it's something like: OP decides to move (which he did) Is promised full WFH remote work or a position in Portland office OP moves and is happy with it VP level issues come about that actually full remote isn't possible, or the project is reshuffled/canned, and there ends up being nothing equivalent in Portland.
  - psyc 5y ago
    Ah right, I forgot about the WFH part. I can imagine one’s leverage declining quickly in that case. Special circumstances, plus out of sight out of mind.
- vl 5y ago
  > because I can’t figure out how that could happen and not be trivial to fix. Oh, there are many ways this could be non-trivial to fix. For example, at Google, there is a section of review that employees don’t see. It’s visible only to managers and committees. So there could be something negative in this section. Now HR looks at remote work arrangement, to this review section and says “we can’t allow remote work with such feedback”. Employee non-the-wiser is befuddled about sudden change of heart while bureaucracy is working as intended. Or maybe they figured out that he moved but didn’t report it in time. Now, they can sweep it under the rag, or raise issue of tax and benefit fraud and “start investigation”. And so on.

I honestly don't understand what "bureaucratic error" means in this context. Does it imply office politics? Surely even Google won't let a top engineer leave due to purely administrative issues.

girvo 5y ago

> Surely even Google I think it's _more_ likely to happen at a company the scale of Google, frankly.

thrdbndndn 5y ago
That's what I meant? "Even XX won't" means while XX is more likely to do YY, it shouldn't get to this degree.
- girvo 5y ago
  I must be misunderstanding I'm afraid. From my perspective, it's incredibly unsurprising that a company as large as Google and run the way Google is would let a top engineer leave due to administrative issues

high_derivative 5y ago

As a FAANG employee, the way this typically happens is this: There is some sort of team reshuffle, someone moving to a new project and so on. Another team agrees to take on a high level IC (I assume this guy was at least L8-9). At that level, this move is approved by a VP. Person moves, headcount is filled/removed at his old team. Then new VP decides he is not ok with some part of the working arrangement (e.g. remote, scope). Person is now given a few weeks to find a few project/team, but most teams cannot accommodate senior ICs at that level easily. Boom, out of a job. Basically VP backroom dealings. It's just 'bureaucracy', and seniority almost does not matter. The only way to stop it at that point would be calling other VPs or SVPs for favours. In fact, seniority works against you here, because it becomes more political, while nobody cares about a low level IC switching around, and almost any org can absorb a solid L5 contributor.

thrdbndndn 5y ago
Thanks, that makes sense. I never worked in software engineering industry or in a big enough company that has internal "teams" organized this way.
- reducesuffering 5y ago
  OP alludes to it coinciding with leaving California. And since OP's leaving California post is in February, while indicating he left Google last month, it's possible it was some sort of remote-work snafu.
  - DoreenMichele 5y ago
    He essentially says as much: ...my move away from California led to the end of my career there.
vl 5y ago
This is even a problem (for many people surprisingly) at L6: you have your specialization, and very few directors will agree to get L6 with unmatching specialization. But there could be only so many Android projects, or iPhone projects, or ML at any given site. So if you try to change teams, you quickly learn that there are just couple potential positions for you.
- ozzythecat 5y ago
  This is almost certainly not a problem at every FANG company. I’m at Amazon now and heads down in interviews. I work with a few different teams on both mobile apps and services. I don’t particularly care for specialization and I know as a company we’re looking for engineers across the board. If you can code, you’ll be smart enough to ramp up on whatever stack a team is working on.
- neilv 5y ago
  Is this due to how budgets are allocated to teams? Or something else?

vl 5y ago

Google is notoriously stupid about remote work. While bunch of people did it under the rag or by special arrangements, default policy was “no”. They run infamous “defrags” by trying consolidating projects in fewer location in process fucking up teams, products and making people leave. Anyway, here probably HR got a sniff of employee relocating, and while they emailed back-and-forth arguing, it pissed him enough that he decided to bug out. Or maybe some manager used this as opportunity to skillfully kick him out presenting it on the outside as “error”.

ghaff 5y ago
Some variant on this seems likely. I know someone who is something of an industry name and he got hired at Google. His working remotely was tolerated--until it wasn't and he ended up leaving. It certainly sounds as if OP moving to Portland was the proximate issue which he either couldn't resolve or he just decided that he couldn't be bothered to seriously try to resolve it. There are times when you're half ready to move on and a bump in the road can be all it takes.

psyc 5y ago

I really wish he’d explained, because I can’t figure out how that could happen and not be trivial to fix. I have no idea what goes on in Google, but I worked at Microsoft HQ for many years. Sure, it’s overwhelmingly gargantuan in many ways, but if I got ‘accidentally fired’ the most likely thing is my manager would find out about it and fix it before I even found out. In the event that it fell on me to act, I could stroll down the hall to my manager, my skip level, or the general manager. And if the GM didn’t want me gone, somebody above them (and that does not include HR) would have to positively want me gone, or it wouldn’t happen. Perhaps this person actually wanted to leave, and so decided it was like a sign that it was a good time to go.

reducesuffering 5y ago
It's possible it's something like: OP decides to move (which he did) Is promised full WFH remote work or a position in Portland office OP moves and is happy with it VP level issues come about that actually full remote isn't possible, or the project is reshuffled/canned, and there ends up being nothing equivalent in Portland.
- psyc 5y ago
  Ah right, I forgot about the WFH part. I can imagine one’s leverage declining quickly in that case. Special circumstances, plus out of sight out of mind.
vl 5y ago
> because I can’t figure out how that could happen and not be trivial to fix. Oh, there are many ways this could be non-trivial to fix. For example, at Google, there is a section of review that employees don’t see. It’s visible only to managers and committees. So there could be something negative in this section. Now HR looks at remote work arrangement, to this review section and says “we can’t allow remote work with such feedback”. Employee non-the-wiser is befuddled about sudden change of heart while bureaucracy is working as intended. Or maybe they figured out that he moved but didn’t report it in time. Now, they can sweep it under the rag, or raise issue of tax and benefit fraud and “start investigation”. And so on.