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Original article: https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-is-scrapping-its-plan-to-offer-bank-accounts-to-users-11633104001 https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-is-s

by kyrra 5y ago

Original article: https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-is-scrapping-its-plan-to-offer-bank-accounts-to-users-11633104001 https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-is-scrapping-its-plan-to... Mirror: https://archive.is/DfNpk https://archive.is/DfNpk Googler, opinions are my own. This was an ambitious product. It was lead by Caesar Sengupta, who left back in March. Without the project's primary driver, it got killed off (at least before it launched).

ocdtrekkie 5y ago
This seems like another incredible example of a bad product management strategy of "whatever some employee wants to do". Why would a major product direction be shelved because one guy switched jobs? If it was a good product, Google should restaff the project. If it was not a good product, Google should seriously rethink the autonomy it gives staff to decide to launch new products.
- cat199 5y ago
  he moved fast, and things broke - what's not to like?
- kevmo314 5y ago
  Seems like a pretty good strategy to me. It's cool that one employee can drive such a large change. Google should get better at retaining talent though to mitigate this type of risk.
  - kyrra 5y ago
    Caeser was a VP at Google. In the story from when he left[0], his replacement has 3,700 people under him. So it's a single person with a huge amount of influence. Bill Ready came in and decided to do something different. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28251591 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28251591
- mywittyname 5y ago
  > This seems like another incredible example of a bad product management strategy of "whatever some employee wants to do". It would be bad if they used this strategy for every employee, but for certain employees, notably, those who are likely to go found their own startups, it can be a great idea. Google gets the potential to finance a "startup" for a fraction of the hypothetical acquisition costs, and the downside is paying the salary of a few dead weights if the produce never takes off.
  - ocdtrekkie 5y ago
    I understand that concept, but there are better ways to do that. Nobody is shocked when an Area 120 app (or a Microsoft Garage app) gets shelved, because those are "brands" specifically for Google and Microsoft to experiment with startupy apps. But when Google decides to put their main brand behind something, announce it to the world, start collecting signups, only to shut it down, that ends up continuing to burn the company's reputation. In this case, it also represented a significant partnership with a major bank, which may have burned some bridges along the way. And bear in mind, in this case, it sounds like this VP had 3,700 employees under him... hardly a trivial cost of all the wasted effort.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
xnx 5y ago
I'm a huge fan of Google and was interested to see where this initiative went. After seeing how Google Pay went (e.g. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/03/the-new-google-pay-repeats-all-the-same-mistakes-of-google-allo/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/03/the-new-google-pay-r...), the world may not have missed out on much.
- Marsymars 5y ago
  The Google Pay thing is a bit odd, because the new one is only actually available in 3 of the 40 countries that Google Pay supports - most places are still using the old one.
tlogan 5y ago
I think he left because he knew that the project will be killed.
- latchkey 5y ago
  He was at Google for 15 years. Now working on something else in finance (and he is based in Singapore). https://techcrunch.com/2021/03/21/next-billion-users-head-caesar-sengupta-is-leaving-google/ https://techcrunch.com/2021/03/21/next-billion-users-head-ca... https://www.arbo.works/ https://www.arbo.works/
- r00fus 5y ago
  I wonder how the lead of an ambitious project like this one gets wind of an upcoming project cancellation? Is it changing business needs, or political winds shifting?
  - arthurcolle 5y ago
    You can frequently see the writing on the wall even if its not explicitly made clear, especially in a megacorp
cronix 5y ago
> Without the project's primary driver Google has never heard of single points of failure? Strange. Is this how all of your products are run, in that if the "head" of the project leaves/gets ill/dies the whole thing just vaporizes?
- cjsplat 5y ago
  You jumped from a story about one emerging business line concept to "all of your products", which is a pretty big leap. It is actually very common for new business ideas to live or die based on the support from one senior executive - I saw this from the inside at Fujitsu, Oracle, Sun and Google, and at many partner companies from the outside. In a new business line at an established large company, there is almost always another business line executive's toes you are going to step on. For example, making computer hardware at Oracle steps on the toes of Oracle people selling to computer hardware makers. Shifting to open source steps on toes of internal developers and existing suppliers. It takes a executive support to maintain these kinds of programs until the expected gain can be evaluated fairly against than the risks. If a key executive leaves there is quite often blow back on their pet projects. From the perspective "outside the room" it is frequently unclear whether the exec was just moving on, fighting to the end, or saw the writing on the wall and left while the leaving was good.

by kyrra 5y ago

ocdtrekkie 5y ago

This seems like another incredible example of a bad product management strategy of "whatever some employee wants to do". Why would a major product direction be shelved because one guy switched jobs? If it was a good product, Google should restaff the project. If it was not a good product, Google should seriously rethink the autonomy it gives staff to decide to launch new products.

cat199 5y ago
he moved fast, and things broke - what's not to like?
kevmo314 5y ago
Seems like a pretty good strategy to me. It's cool that one employee can drive such a large change. Google should get better at retaining talent though to mitigate this type of risk.
- kyrra 5y ago
  Caeser was a VP at Google. In the story from when he left[0], his replacement has 3,700 people under him. So it's a single person with a huge amount of influence. Bill Ready came in and decided to do something different. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28251591 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28251591
mywittyname 5y ago
> This seems like another incredible example of a bad product management strategy of "whatever some employee wants to do". It would be bad if they used this strategy for every employee, but for certain employees, notably, those who are likely to go found their own startups, it can be a great idea. Google gets the potential to finance a "startup" for a fraction of the hypothetical acquisition costs, and the downside is paying the salary of a few dead weights if the produce never takes off.
- ocdtrekkie 5y ago
  I understand that concept, but there are better ways to do that. Nobody is shocked when an Area 120 app (or a Microsoft Garage app) gets shelved, because those are "brands" specifically for Google and Microsoft to experiment with startupy apps. But when Google decides to put their main brand behind something, announce it to the world, start collecting signups, only to shut it down, that ends up continuing to burn the company's reputation. In this case, it also represented a significant partnership with a major bank, which may have burned some bridges along the way. And bear in mind, in this case, it sounds like this VP had 3,700 employees under him... hardly a trivial cost of all the wasted effort.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

xnx 5y ago

I'm a huge fan of Google and was interested to see where this initiative went. After seeing how Google Pay went (e.g. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/03/the-new-google-pay-repeats-all-the-same-mistakes-of-google-allo/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/03/the-new-google-pay-r...), the world may not have missed out on much.

Marsymars 5y ago
The Google Pay thing is a bit odd, because the new one is only actually available in 3 of the 40 countries that Google Pay supports - most places are still using the old one.

tlogan 5y ago

I think he left because he knew that the project will be killed.

latchkey 5y ago
He was at Google for 15 years. Now working on something else in finance (and he is based in Singapore). https://techcrunch.com/2021/03/21/next-billion-users-head-caesar-sengupta-is-leaving-google/ https://techcrunch.com/2021/03/21/next-billion-users-head-ca... https://www.arbo.works/ https://www.arbo.works/
r00fus 5y ago
I wonder how the lead of an ambitious project like this one gets wind of an upcoming project cancellation? Is it changing business needs, or political winds shifting?
- arthurcolle 5y ago
  You can frequently see the writing on the wall even if its not explicitly made clear, especially in a megacorp

cronix 5y ago

> Without the project's primary driver Google has never heard of single points of failure? Strange. Is this how all of your products are run, in that if the "head" of the project leaves/gets ill/dies the whole thing just vaporizes?

cjsplat 5y ago
You jumped from a story about one emerging business line concept to "all of your products", which is a pretty big leap. It is actually very common for new business ideas to live or die based on the support from one senior executive - I saw this from the inside at Fujitsu, Oracle, Sun and Google, and at many partner companies from the outside. In a new business line at an established large company, there is almost always another business line executive's toes you are going to step on. For example, making computer hardware at Oracle steps on the toes of Oracle people selling to computer hardware makers. Shifting to open source steps on toes of internal developers and existing suppliers. It takes a executive support to maintain these kinds of programs until the expected gain can be evaluated fairly against than the risks. If a key executive leaves there is quite often blow back on their pet projects. From the perspective "outside the room" it is frequently unclear whether the exec was just moving on, fighting to the end, or saw the writing on the wall and left while the leaving was good.