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They decide that you are an elite engineer primarily based on whether you went to an elite school. Elite code. Elite engineers. Elite schools. Elite company

They decide that you are an elite engineer primarily based on whether you went to an elite school. Elite code. Elite engineers. Elite schools. Elite company. How very elitist. This whole "Google is elitist" meme is silly. They hired me as an SRE, and yet I didn't attend high school, went to a state college, and had something like a 3.2 GPA. Stop being so afraid of failure that you never try to succeed.

Newkleer 15y ago
The implication here is that working for google is success. Working for someone else is only success if you're afraid of failure.
- jmillikin 15y ago
  Working on something challenging and rewarding is success. Refusing to apply to a challenging/rewarding job because one's afraid of being rejected is failure. Defending one's choice with appeals to "elitism" is justification.
- 0x12 15y ago
  It takes lots of different kinds of people to make a success. If the company you start can't hire people because everybody thinks like you do you too will fail. The attitude that you can't be 'successful' in life unless you start a company is really out of touch with reality, I'd argue that it takes all kinds for everybody to even have a chance at achieving their definition of success, and people that do not achieve your definition of success are not automatically failures.
plinkplonk 15y ago
"This whole "Google is elitist" meme is silly. They hired me as an SRE, and yet I didn't attend high school, went to a state college, and had something like a 3.2 GPA." Would changing the OP's sentence to "Google is mostly elitist" help? (Genuine Question). You might (please note the emphasis on 'might') be the exception that proves the rule. Here in Bangalore, for example, it is known that Google has a strong bias towards IIT grads and academic performance. Whether such a strong preference for such schools/academic scores etc should be labelled "elitist" is a different debate. Fwiw, my gut feel is that if you are a strong enough engineer, you can get Google to override this bias.
- Locke1689 15y ago
  Perhaps the hiring field in Bangalore is different? It would make sense to prioritize school more if there is a large amount of mediocre tech talent applying in that talent pool. Google doesn't have completely unlimited resources to donate to hiring. FWIW I have also felt that it's been my achievements in school (and largely out of school, in open source work), that put me on Google's radar, not simply the fact that I go to a good school.
  - plinkplonk 15y ago
    That is probably why,though I am somewhat dubious of IIT grads being better programmers than the average tech talent even in Bangalore. Saying that often brings a violent reaction from IIT grads, but I've found it to be largely true. Iow, I am not sure school has anything to do with programming ability (it might be interesting to draw up a matrix of dev superstars and schools. hmm). Unlike Stanford or MIT, IITs don't do world class research. They have a good bachelors degree program. And Google Bangalore doesn't do "cars that drive themselves" style work anyway. From what friends who work at Google tell me, Google Bangalore doesn't have a(n internal) reputation (to put it mildly) of pulling off feats of superior engineering skill. That said, I have zero issues with Google using any criteria they want to hire devs (just in case it wasn't clear earlier). I don't consider them "elitist" just because they do what works for them. In fact I don't even believe in the "elitism" concept. I think it is a largely empty word used to mean "they do things in a way that I find unsatisfactory". Even if Google has a hiring bias towards IIT grads, the best way for a non-iit grad to get a job offer from Google (if that is what he wants) is to be a better engineer than the favored folks. "Be so good they can't ignore you" as a wise man said. Good Advice.
    - statictype 15y ago
      That is probably why,though I am somewhat dubious of IIT grads being better programmers than the average tech talent even in Bangalore. You're probably right (and I say that as an IIT grad). Most of the people I knew there were significantly smarter than me but couldn't program their way out of a paper bag.
rachelbythebay 15y ago
SA-SRE or SWE-SRE?
- jmillikin 15y ago
  SWE-SRE
  - rachelbythebay 15y ago
    Okay, well, that means you won the caste system at hiring time at least. SA-SREs are pretty much stuck in sysadmin roles (unless they go through the interview process again -- no joke).
    - jmillikin 15y ago
      Seems fair; if I wanted to transition to a different job role (or even a very different SWE team, like kernel development) I would expect to be re-interviewed. A developer might a good fit somewhere in the company, but that doesn't mean they'll do well everywhere.
      - rachelbythebay 15y ago
        Funny you should mention kernel development. You'd really want to do it for people going the other way, since most of the folks who wrangle the kernel there are not familiar with the Secret Sauce systems. You know, like the one called "MapReduce", cough cough. I speak from experience: my SA-SRE limbo involved leaving SRE and landing in a role expected to bridge the kernel team to prod, by making their tests work on the things which involve Lots Of Machines (tm). That was a SWE job through and through but it did not give me the ability to transfer out of it until I went through the process last year.
        ChuckMcM 15y ago
        Grats. Nice to hear good news now and again.
      - 15y ago
jhdavids8 15y ago
Agreed. I went to a state college not at all respected for software engineering graduates and Google got ahold of me this summer asking if I had interest working for them (I declined). Google could (largely) care less what school you went to. Your work, what you do after school, should speak to your talents and if they only want the elite based on your post-college work, well then good for them. Why would they hire you when your history yells "I'M MEDIOCRE!" You have to prove yourself beforehand. Oh, and if the job posting has the statement "if you plan to become [an expert in distributed computing]", I'd say that's far from saying only the elite will be considered. Anyway, the post is largely silly. The OP goes into a rant on "I don't care about any of what Google does", then mentions Google+ and MapReduce. Yes, that's all Google has going on these days. Saying Google can't keep up with the world when Amazon can is beyond ridiculous. Hell, Google has defined a large part of the modern world and continues to expand on that. Honestly, I'm a larger fan of Amazon than Google, but Amazon IS TRYING to catch up to Google and only dabbles in a small percentage of what Google does. The OP only points out a few features that Amazon has that Google doesn't (or at least doesn't offer openly and freely to all). Going past that, Google's offerings extend so much farther than Amazon's that it's hard to even begin listing them. Want a 3D representation of the entire world? Google has you covered. You could make those statements for pages. Why do we even argue about this silliness?

Newkleer 15y ago

The implication here is that working for google is success. Working for someone else is only success if you're afraid of failure.

jmillikin 15y ago
Working on something challenging and rewarding is success. Refusing to apply to a challenging/rewarding job because one's afraid of being rejected is failure. Defending one's choice with appeals to "elitism" is justification.
0x12 15y ago
It takes lots of different kinds of people to make a success. If the company you start can't hire people because everybody thinks like you do you too will fail. The attitude that you can't be 'successful' in life unless you start a company is really out of touch with reality, I'd argue that it takes all kinds for everybody to even have a chance at achieving their definition of success, and people that do not achieve your definition of success are not automatically failures.

plinkplonk 15y ago

"This whole "Google is elitist" meme is silly. They hired me as an SRE, and yet I didn't attend high school, went to a state college, and had something like a 3.2 GPA." Would changing the OP's sentence to "Google is mostly elitist" help? (Genuine Question). You might (please note the emphasis on 'might') be the exception that proves the rule. Here in Bangalore, for example, it is known that Google has a strong bias towards IIT grads and academic performance. Whether such a strong preference for such schools/academic scores etc should be labelled "elitist" is a different debate. Fwiw, my gut feel is that if you are a strong enough engineer, you can get Google to override this bias.

Locke1689 15y ago
Perhaps the hiring field in Bangalore is different? It would make sense to prioritize school more if there is a large amount of mediocre tech talent applying in that talent pool. Google doesn't have completely unlimited resources to donate to hiring. FWIW I have also felt that it's been my achievements in school (and largely out of school, in open source work), that put me on Google's radar, not simply the fact that I go to a good school.
- plinkplonk 15y ago
  That is probably why,though I am somewhat dubious of IIT grads being better programmers than the average tech talent even in Bangalore. Saying that often brings a violent reaction from IIT grads, but I've found it to be largely true. Iow, I am not sure school has anything to do with programming ability (it might be interesting to draw up a matrix of dev superstars and schools. hmm). Unlike Stanford or MIT, IITs don't do world class research. They have a good bachelors degree program. And Google Bangalore doesn't do "cars that drive themselves" style work anyway. From what friends who work at Google tell me, Google Bangalore doesn't have a(n internal) reputation (to put it mildly) of pulling off feats of superior engineering skill. That said, I have zero issues with Google using any criteria they want to hire devs (just in case it wasn't clear earlier). I don't consider them "elitist" just because they do what works for them. In fact I don't even believe in the "elitism" concept. I think it is a largely empty word used to mean "they do things in a way that I find unsatisfactory". Even if Google has a hiring bias towards IIT grads, the best way for a non-iit grad to get a job offer from Google (if that is what he wants) is to be a better engineer than the favored folks. "Be so good they can't ignore you" as a wise man said. Good Advice.
  - statictype 15y ago
    That is probably why,though I am somewhat dubious of IIT grads being better programmers than the average tech talent even in Bangalore. You're probably right (and I say that as an IIT grad). Most of the people I knew there were significantly smarter than me but couldn't program their way out of a paper bag.

rachelbythebay 15y ago

SA-SRE or SWE-SRE?

jmillikin 15y ago
SWE-SRE
- rachelbythebay 15y ago
  Okay, well, that means you won the caste system at hiring time at least. SA-SREs are pretty much stuck in sysadmin roles (unless they go through the interview process again -- no joke).
  - jmillikin 15y ago
    Seems fair; if I wanted to transition to a different job role (or even a very different SWE team, like kernel development) I would expect to be re-interviewed. A developer might a good fit somewhere in the company, but that doesn't mean they'll do well everywhere.
    - rachelbythebay 15y ago
      Funny you should mention kernel development. You'd really want to do it for people going the other way, since most of the folks who wrangle the kernel there are not familiar with the Secret Sauce systems. You know, like the one called "MapReduce", cough cough. I speak from experience: my SA-SRE limbo involved leaving SRE and landing in a role expected to bridge the kernel team to prod, by making their tests work on the things which involve Lots Of Machines (tm). That was a SWE job through and through but it did not give me the ability to transfer out of it until I went through the process last year.
      - ChuckMcM 15y ago
        Grats. Nice to hear good news now and again.
    - 15y ago

jhdavids8 15y ago

Agreed. I went to a state college not at all respected for software engineering graduates and Google got ahold of me this summer asking if I had interest working for them (I declined). Google could (largely) care less what school you went to. Your work, what you do after school, should speak to your talents and if they only want the elite based on your post-college work, well then good for them. Why would they hire you when your history yells "I'M MEDIOCRE!" You have to prove yourself beforehand. Oh, and if the job posting has the statement "if you plan to become [an expert in distributed computing]", I'd say that's far from saying only the elite will be considered. Anyway, the post is largely silly. The OP goes into a rant on "I don't care about any of what Google does", then mentions Google+ and MapReduce. Yes, that's all Google has going on these days. Saying Google can't keep up with the world when Amazon can is beyond ridiculous. Hell, Google has defined a large part of the modern world and continues to expand on that. Honestly, I'm a larger fan of Amazon than Google, but Amazon IS TRYING to catch up to Google and only dabbles in a small percentage of what Google does. The OP only points out a few features that Amazon has that Google doesn't (or at least doesn't offer openly and freely to all). Going past that, Google's offerings extend so much farther than Amazon's that it's hard to even begin listing them. Want a 3D representation of the entire world? Google has you covered. You could make those statements for pages. Why do we even argue about this silliness?