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I don't think it's propaganda. Put yourself in place of a 30 year old who has only known a world where you're a highly in-demand whatever "in tech". You've ne

I don't think it's propaganda. Put yourself in place of a 30 year old who has only known a world where you're a highly in-demand whatever "in tech". You've never seen a day since you graduated where you're not flooded by recruiter emails. You've never worked a job that isn't 30 minutes of work and then the rest of the day is posting "day in the life of a FAANG employee" Tiktoks or being a paid activist. What's coming is nearly unimaginable. At some level you know it's theoretically possible, but before your eyes even accept that reality you're going to go through some painful stages, beginning with denial. I don't fault anyone, especially anyone who graduated in '10 or later for this. I just hope they are preparing for this.

guiomie 4y ago
Spot on. There is a huge sense of entitlement from SWEs in FAANGs right now, and from the various folks I know at FAANGs, Google is worst since mediocrity and unproductiveness are not confronted because folks are scared of being 'ungoogley'. Every company has its dead weight that others have to carry, I think Google has much more and has been getting away with it because of all its profits coming in.
- whimsicalism 4y ago
  > I think Google has much more and has been getting away with it because of all its profits coming in. My sense would be that Google has such high $ earned / employee compared to other major tech employers it perhaps has less dead-weight.
- cmrdporcupine 4y ago
  Google's definition of productivity is different than yours. In general: Code reviews are strict and long. Style and structure matters more than anywhere else I ever worked. Everything requires extensive testing. You better have a design doc / PRD, some tickets, good commenting, and unit tests. People will happily point out and roast you for any potential bugs, race conditions, deadlocks, bad style, and sloppy work. Mediocrity in this regard is not generally tolerated. The standard of development is much higher. But yes, it's slow. If that's your measure of productivity, they'll fail. Except it doesn't matter because the goal of a SWE at Google is mostly to keep the ship sailing.
whimsicalism 4y ago
This comment is setting off all of my "culture war" alarm bells that typically I do not find on HN. References to TikTok and "paid activists", "never working a job that isn't 30 minutes of work." I'm not sure if I am supposed to take these claims seriously or whether they are exaggerations to paint a picture. Obviously this caricature doesn't describe the vast majority of engineers at Google or other "FAANG" companies. > I don't fault anyone, especially anyone who graduated in '10 or later for this. I just hope they are preparing for this. The '20 post-covid labor market was weaker for graduates than in '08 [0] and hiring in tech is more challenging. [0]: https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/17/why-the-pandemic-might-be-worse-than-great-recession-for-new-graduates.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/17/why-the-pandemic-might-be-wo...
munificent 4y ago
Anyone from the US who graduated in '10 had 9/11 as the formative event of their childhood, followed by the Great Recession just as they reached workforce age. For almost their entire lives, the US was at war, and for every day of their lives, they watched the climate get worse. They know in their bones that they're growing up in a world worse than the one their parents grew up in, and that it's largely the fault of institutions that were morally reponsible for protecting them and failed to do so. They've been preparing for doom since they were weaned.

guiomie 4y ago

Spot on. There is a huge sense of entitlement from SWEs in FAANGs right now, and from the various folks I know at FAANGs, Google is worst since mediocrity and unproductiveness are not confronted because folks are scared of being 'ungoogley'. Every company has its dead weight that others have to carry, I think Google has much more and has been getting away with it because of all its profits coming in.

whimsicalism 4y ago
> I think Google has much more and has been getting away with it because of all its profits coming in. My sense would be that Google has such high $ earned / employee compared to other major tech employers it perhaps has less dead-weight.
cmrdporcupine 4y ago
Google's definition of productivity is different than yours. In general: Code reviews are strict and long. Style and structure matters more than anywhere else I ever worked. Everything requires extensive testing. You better have a design doc / PRD, some tickets, good commenting, and unit tests. People will happily point out and roast you for any potential bugs, race conditions, deadlocks, bad style, and sloppy work. Mediocrity in this regard is not generally tolerated. The standard of development is much higher. But yes, it's slow. If that's your measure of productivity, they'll fail. Except it doesn't matter because the goal of a SWE at Google is mostly to keep the ship sailing.

whimsicalism 4y ago

This comment is setting off all of my "culture war" alarm bells that typically I do not find on HN. References to TikTok and "paid activists", "never working a job that isn't 30 minutes of work." I'm not sure if I am supposed to take these claims seriously or whether they are exaggerations to paint a picture. Obviously this caricature doesn't describe the vast majority of engineers at Google or other "FAANG" companies. > I don't fault anyone, especially anyone who graduated in '10 or later for this. I just hope they are preparing for this. The '20 post-covid labor market was weaker for graduates than in '08 [0] and hiring in tech is more challenging. [0]: https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/17/why-the-pandemic-might-be-worse-than-great-recession-for-new-graduates.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/17/why-the-pandemic-might-be-wo...

munificent 4y ago

Anyone from the US who graduated in '10 had 9/11 as the formative event of their childhood, followed by the Great Recession just as they reached workforce age. For almost their entire lives, the US was at war, and for every day of their lives, they watched the climate get worse. They know in their bones that they're growing up in a world worse than the one their parents grew up in, and that it's largely the fault of institutions that were morally reponsible for protecting them and failed to do so. They've been preparing for doom since they were weaned.