8 ms·

Why the ‘Best Places to Work’ Often Aren’t

113 points by frostmatthew 12y ago

glesica 12y ago
I once worked in a very, very low-on-the-totem-pole position for a company ranked highly on the Fortune "Best Companies to Work For". The reason their employees said such nice things about them is that they went to great lengths to only hire people who would "drink the Kool-Aid", so to speak. If you only hire people who can be convinced that you are wonderful, your employees will surely say that you are wonderful. That being said, it was not a completely terrible place to work. There are much worse. It would have been hard to convince even "suckers" that it was a good place to work if it had, in fact, been a truly awful place to work. But it definitely wasn't great. The pay was mediocre, and the expectations were through the roof. And if you didn't act sufficiently grateful, if you didn't appear thrilled to be there at all times, then it actually became a pretty hostile place to spend time.
- pketh 12y ago
  I've had _exactly_ this same experience in the past as well.
- mc32 12y ago
  I've worked at one of these places too. Some managers knew the deal, others, for whatever reason, drank and lived the kool-aid. That is to say, they truly believed in it or at least believed believing would get them somewhere and did everything in their power to advance it. I can be satirical and sarcastic --most managers were okay with it as it helped to relieve pressures and a way to communicate issues --a few saw this as heresy. I really can't stand that kind of manager. One who believes so much in the system they are so personally vested in the company ideology.
- mattm 12y ago
  This is the real reason behind when companies say things like "We only hire the best." It's not to attract the best, it's for people working there to believe that they are part of the "best" (whatever that means). The way pretty much every company finds people is that it hires the best, according to subjective and biased criteria, from the people that currently are looking or don't have jobs who tend to live in the area and happened to find out the company had an opening.
7Figures2Commas 12y ago
This is timely in light of the "Dear Future Homejoy Engineer" job posting[1] that is currently on the front page. It starts off with "so it's xmas eve and i'm in the office with several other folks who didn’t have plans for xmas either. everyone is cranking away. we’ve decided to watch the interview later and then get dinner and drinks together" and gets more depressing from there. This article speaks about "four core needs" of employees ("physical, emotional, mental and spiritual") but the author doesn't seem willing to consider the possibility that employers aren't capable of meeting these deep personal needs in the first place. Personally, I think the imbalance, chaos and unsustainable pace you see in even the supposedly "best" workplaces is more often than not just a reflection of the fact that large numbers of individuals don't set boundaries, prioritize or make a dedicated effort to invest in their own health and well-being. These people are not going to go to the Googleplex or a hot startup's swagged-out SOMA digs and suddenly find enlightenment. Unhappy, unbalanced people are going to be unhappy and unbalanced wherever they go and in many cases, they'll seek out environments that are unhappy and unbalanced. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8794956 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8794956
- righttoremember 12y ago
  Given that some people are "unbalanced, unhappy" people, isn't it actually a good thing, rather than "depressing" as you say, that they can find companionship in their workplaces. Is it really better for people with nothing to do at Xmas eve to go home and be alone anyway? Is it the employers responsibility to ensure that the company culture makes zero allowances for these people?
  - smacktoward 12y ago
    It's not the job of employees to provide companionship for their employers. You're hiring workers, not friends. If employees want to get together on their own time and spend the holiday together, that's cool. But it gets less cool the more you mix in expecting them to do work for you and/or fill in gaps in your social life.
    - 12y ago
tonysuper 12y ago
So, for those of is trying to start companies, how do you create an effective work-place environment? It's obvious from articles like this that you can't just dump a bunch of cash on slides and ping-pong tables, but it also isn't fesable (for most companies) to have 4-hour workdays. How can you balance the need for breaks with budget concerns? I'd really appreciate somebody with experience in the area weighing in.
- ryan90 12y ago
  Speaking from experienced (startup that's made 3 hires, going on our 4th), is you have to find "culture fits". People who share your appetite for work, who want to be a part of the vision, and that you can stand spending a lot of time with. We'll never win the perk war, but we are the only company just like us, and look very hard for the people who will get along with us.
  - VexXtreme 12y ago
    I think you'll find that most people will "get along" with you just fine if you're a decent person, pay well and don't ask them to sacrifice a too big portion of their life. If they're competent and willing to work hard, everything else is noise and bullshit.
    - ryan90 12y ago
      Yes working hard and competent is the bulk of it. But we've met people like that we simply wouldn't bond with. Culture fit is hugely important, and if you hire a cultural misfit, it's much more difficult to fire them.
      - VexXtreme 12y ago
        Since the concept of "culture" is so vague and no one using it seems to be able to describe what exact set of criteria it represents, it appears to be whatever a hiring manager wants it to be. If you don't like someone's skin color, religion, cultural background, the fact that they don't like drinking or going to team-building trips every weekend, or you just don't like the color of their shirt, it's easy to reject them on the grounds of not being a "culture fit". Who cares about their professional skillset when you're obviously looking for a paid buddy. Curb your hubris and start treating people like human beings. I've worked for a number of "world changing" startups managed by 20-something year olds like you and the fact that it always devolved into a high school popularity contest made me sick to my stomach.
nostrademons 12y ago
Ex-Googler here, now working on my own startup. I had weeks at Google with 14 hour days and time in on the weekends. I also had weeks where I worked 4-6 hours/day and put away the phone & laptop on the weekend, or even ducked out at 2:30 on a Friday afternoon so I could celebrate my anniversary with my girlfriend. I appreciate the sentiment of the article, but there's a lot of complexity to the issue that it ignores. For one, most of the time that I was working crazy hours was because I a.) wanted and b.) needed to. I believed in the project's mission, the work was fun & challenging, and there was a lot to do that just wouldn't get done if I didn't put in the hours. Similarly, when I worked very light hours, it was because there wasn't much work that I had to do. I was blocked on other teams, or in-between projects and my manager didn't have a good idea where I'd be productive at the moment, or "held in reserve" so that if we needed to react quickly to market opportunities I'd be well-rested and not occupied by other projects. Working hard is not always a bad thing, or onerous, or exhausting. Sometimes employees work hard because they believe in what they're doing and want to do a good job; that's part of what makes a company a good place to work, after all. And sometimes it is, and creates a very unhealthy competition where everybody tries to outdo each other. I think that one of the things that Google in general and Larry Page in particular realizes is that people will have different desires for work/life balance at different stages in their life, and that within a large company, there should be places that can accommodate everyone from the achievement-oriented new Ph.D grad to the family with a young kid.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- pauleastlund 12y ago
  This was my experience at Google as well. I was there a little over five years. There were times when I was completely in love with my team and my project and I was working until 3AM and feeling great about what I was getting done. There were times when I was burnt out or dealing with personal/medical issues and not contributing nearly that much. I can't complain about how I was treated in either circumstance. Beyond my own experience, I had multiple teammates who had long commutes and family commitments and made a rigid practice of leaving before five every single day. As far as I know, none of them were ever given any trouble about it. Maybe they weren't promoted as fast as if they'd burned the midnight oil, but that seems like a fair trade.
WalterBright 12y ago
I work for myself. The only problem is my boss is incompetent.
- seivan 12y ago
  Mine doesn't seem to be able to make a decision and settle for it.
- zerr 12y ago
  Walter, I still don't know how you make money :)
- gonzo 12y ago
  Bill Joy used to say that the number of bright employees in a company was the log of the number of employees. He would then explain that he had not expressed the base, which could be different on a company by company basis. Though he never expressed the result for the self-employed, log(1) = 0 in any base.
  - WalterBright 12y ago
    I'm certain that my company has one Bright employee in it.
ryan90 12y ago
This topic is very valid, but far to complex and nuanced to be addressed in a single article. Long hours at Google? Please. The long hours argument would certainly hold up at many of the other companies on the list, however. Point being that no generalization can define why these rankings are misleading (though they certainly can be).
michaelochurch 12y ago
Different take on this: being perceived as "the cultural leader" is actually detrimental to a company. Let's take Google as an example, although any large company with a strong reputation would do. Take technical or cultural or managerial attribute Q (say, which programming language to privilege). Ask "what is the best Q option for Google?" Most people will admit that they don't know. There are lot of variables. Ask "what is the best Q option for the cultural leader? Suddenly you get a bunch of bikeshedding product executives trying to throw their weight around. Now that it's not "Google" being discussed but "the cultural leader" hanging in the balance, peoples' opinions get much more entangled and politicized (if less relevant to the specific needs of the company, Google). The concept of "the cultural leader" in technology is flawed and dangerous and it attracts people for the wrong reasons. You should hire the people who want to make a cultural leader by doing great work and, um, leading... not people who want to hold high positions at an organization already recognized for leadership.
trhway 12y ago
best places i worked at i'd not call a "Best Place to Work" as it was about successful work and not about being a "Best Place". Currently i work at a typical BigCo, mindless work, mindless management, one of those highest rated "Best Places to Work" for those who care :)
xigency 12y ago
From interviewing at Google, I had a really robotic impression of employees and life there. The entire process was disorganized. I drove four hours across the state to get there, navigating all sorts of construction, and found my own accommodations. When I arrived on site I was repeatedly asked to solve the same Java/C problems on whiteboards for a new person each time. No one bothered to ask me what made me unique or interesting, even though I have amazing stories to tell from traveling around the world and from projects I've worked on in the past. The free lunch thing is sort of over-blown, when you have to fill out a form and shout over a line of people to get a BLT sandwich made. And then there were a bunch of bicycles strewn out across the campus, mostly toppled over, for no explicable reason. Honestly, the only reason I would want to work there is for the money, and for that reason employees should not really expect to enjoy their time there.
- duaneb 12y ago
  An interview is a fairly terrible way to get to know a company's culture. Among other things, the interview is a filter, not an employment conversation.
  - xigency 12y ago
    At the end of the interview I was left alone in an office where an employee showed up and thought I was there to interview him. Still, I understand your point.
    - swampthing 12y ago
      Out of curiosity, why would an existing employee think anyone would be interviewing him?
      - xigency 12y ago
        He was waiting to use a conference room and misheard me.
        12y ago
defenestration 12y ago
Quote from article: "But these lists don’t really measure something even more important: the quality of their employees’ lives." But the article isn't showing that the quality of life at lower ranked companies is better. In the end you are responsible for your own quality of life. You can achieve amazing things at Google, Facebook, etc, but it comes at a price. Key question is: what do you value most?
bane 12y ago
I work for a "best place to work". Before that I worked at a place I could charitably call a "bottom place to work". I've worked at a few very mediocre places as well. So I've been around the block so to speak. About a decade and a half ago, I worked at a place that doesn't show up on any of these lists. The main day-to-day difference it seems from where I work now and this place I worked at long ago is that I get free candy and juice. The other place had more interesting work. Almost all of my professional acquaintances come from the former place. We have a badass cafeteria, but I still have to pay for it. So I guess that's better than the Amazon gig and the mediocre to decent food I was offered? One of the chefs here is a former Google executive chef, his Polenta with mushroom sauce is pretty good, but a bit tart. I get whatever hardware and resources I've asked for so far. So far I've gotten a large format printer with staff, 3 developers, a new rMBP with top of the line specs, a new monitor, travel expensed and have $100k worth of rack mountable GPUs on order. I'm throwing a lot of people and hardware at a problem that everybody including the client thinks should be solved this way, but for <reasons> probably won't work out in the end...and we all know it. I've found not-for-profits to be consistently decent places to work, plus I can take pride in working at them for all kinds of principled reasons. Even if the pay sucks, the offices tend to be nice and its nice knowing you're helping the species move forward a little every day. The unofficial motto where I work is "fuck the money, do the right thing by the client". I like that. But I know from long-timers that work-life balance kind of sucks and there's been some lean times recently that have left some old-timers hungry with a thirst they can't quite get rid of. There's a yoga class I can take, $60/season. We have a Gym, the showers are cleaned twice a day. I've found that for-profits make me a heck of a lot more money, but range from miserable to mediocre. I've almost worked at Google, Amazon and a few other bright stars on these kinds of lists, but the problems didn't seem terribly interesting even if the cafeterias were cool. I guess pushing ads, on-line retail or some other kind of kool-aidery is hip. I like my Android phone well enough. Maybe if I could have taken that salary and moved cross country and displaced my life, the free catered meals would have been worth it. The quiz-show interview was lame and completely irrelevant for the job they wanted me to do. I've interviewed with a few places that think they're best places to work. 3 catered meals a day, game room, casual dress code, whatever. It's fine, but then they're supporting 10 year old application cruft and the hardest problems they have to solve is supporting the new release of Java. The most I've ever learned, and thus the most rewarding job I ever worked was for a small and scrappy startup that failed. The lessons I learned there have earned me nonstop promotions at better places. I would absolutely do that again if I had a time machine even though it had really sucky aspects to it. It didn't even come close to being a best place to work...though I also got free candy and juice. The best problems I've ever worked was for a shitty shitty mega-corp. They sent me around the world 4 times in two years, to active war zones, where I got shot at. Coding under fire is amazing. Saving people's lives is amazing. Dealing with corporate bullshit back home where none of that is recognized for any reason sucks. I recently was contacted by an employee to answer questions about code I hacked out 7 years ago while I was taking mortar fire. The stories I'll tell my grandkids come from this job. Also not a best place to work. No free juice or candy, no cafeteria. It's interesting McKinsey is in the top-10. I've only ever heard terrible things about working there. The average rate of burn-out is under 2 years for new hires, so the suck factor must be incredibly high. But then again, a McKinsey bullet on your resume opens lots of doors. In-N-Out and Costco are probably great to work if you don't have options. But I definitely need more than $12/hr for the lifestyle I've become accustomed to. I know of Googlers who take month-long spur of the moment vacations 3 times a year and keep advancing. I know others who are on-call and put in hard 14-16 hour days constantly and fight with their managers for their pay increases. It really is relative. If the work doesn't interest you, or the politics suck, or you like getting paid on time, and that matters to you more than anything else, then you might have a terrible time. You want dry-cleaning, catered lunches and work-life balance? Then maybe this list is a good one for you. Google does have interesting problems, but it's likely that you won't be working on them.
hw 12y ago
Question of whether a place is 'good to work at' is pretty much subjective. Some might argue Google is a great place to work given the perks, benefits and compensation. Others might avoid big companies like Google where working long hours is the norm and is in fact recommended (if you want to get out in front of your peers). Others might like companies with less perks, but a great work culture, where there's less focus on facilities but more focus on the having great work / life balance and culture. It's tough to find a company that has both =\

113 points by frostmatthew 12y ago

I once worked in a very, very low-on-the-totem-pole position for a company ranked highly on the Fortune "Best Companies to Work For". The reason their employees said such nice things about them is that they went to great lengths to only hire people who would "drink the Kool-Aid", so to speak. If you only hire people who can be convinced that you are wonderful, your employees will surely say that you are wonderful. That being said, it was not a completely terrible place to work. There are much worse. It would have been hard to convince even "suckers" that it was a good place to work if it had, in fact, been a truly awful place to work. But it definitely wasn't great. The pay was mediocre, and the expectations were through the roof. And if you didn't act sufficiently grateful, if you didn't appear thrilled to be there at all times, then it actually became a pretty hostile place to spend time.

pketh 12y ago
I've had _exactly_ this same experience in the past as well.
mc32 12y ago
I've worked at one of these places too. Some managers knew the deal, others, for whatever reason, drank and lived the kool-aid. That is to say, they truly believed in it or at least believed believing would get them somewhere and did everything in their power to advance it. I can be satirical and sarcastic --most managers were okay with it as it helped to relieve pressures and a way to communicate issues --a few saw this as heresy. I really can't stand that kind of manager. One who believes so much in the system they are so personally vested in the company ideology.
mattm 12y ago
This is the real reason behind when companies say things like "We only hire the best." It's not to attract the best, it's for people working there to believe that they are part of the "best" (whatever that means). The way pretty much every company finds people is that it hires the best, according to subjective and biased criteria, from the people that currently are looking or don't have jobs who tend to live in the area and happened to find out the company had an opening.

7Figures2Commas 12y ago

This is timely in light of the "Dear Future Homejoy Engineer" job posting[1] that is currently on the front page. It starts off with "so it's xmas eve and i'm in the office with several other folks who didn’t have plans for xmas either. everyone is cranking away. we’ve decided to watch the interview later and then get dinner and drinks together" and gets more depressing from there. This article speaks about "four core needs" of employees ("physical, emotional, mental and spiritual") but the author doesn't seem willing to consider the possibility that employers aren't capable of meeting these deep personal needs in the first place. Personally, I think the imbalance, chaos and unsustainable pace you see in even the supposedly "best" workplaces is more often than not just a reflection of the fact that large numbers of individuals don't set boundaries, prioritize or make a dedicated effort to invest in their own health and well-being. These people are not going to go to the Googleplex or a hot startup's swagged-out SOMA digs and suddenly find enlightenment. Unhappy, unbalanced people are going to be unhappy and unbalanced wherever they go and in many cases, they'll seek out environments that are unhappy and unbalanced. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8794956 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8794956

righttoremember 12y ago
Given that some people are "unbalanced, unhappy" people, isn't it actually a good thing, rather than "depressing" as you say, that they can find companionship in their workplaces. Is it really better for people with nothing to do at Xmas eve to go home and be alone anyway? Is it the employers responsibility to ensure that the company culture makes zero allowances for these people?
- smacktoward 12y ago
  It's not the job of employees to provide companionship for their employers. You're hiring workers, not friends. If employees want to get together on their own time and spend the holiday together, that's cool. But it gets less cool the more you mix in expecting them to do work for you and/or fill in gaps in your social life.
  - 12y ago

tonysuper 12y ago

So, for those of is trying to start companies, how do you create an effective work-place environment? It's obvious from articles like this that you can't just dump a bunch of cash on slides and ping-pong tables, but it also isn't fesable (for most companies) to have 4-hour workdays. How can you balance the need for breaks with budget concerns? I'd really appreciate somebody with experience in the area weighing in.

ryan90 12y ago
Speaking from experienced (startup that's made 3 hires, going on our 4th), is you have to find "culture fits". People who share your appetite for work, who want to be a part of the vision, and that you can stand spending a lot of time with. We'll never win the perk war, but we are the only company just like us, and look very hard for the people who will get along with us.
- VexXtreme 12y ago
  I think you'll find that most people will "get along" with you just fine if you're a decent person, pay well and don't ask them to sacrifice a too big portion of their life. If they're competent and willing to work hard, everything else is noise and bullshit.
  - ryan90 12y ago
    Yes working hard and competent is the bulk of it. But we've met people like that we simply wouldn't bond with. Culture fit is hugely important, and if you hire a cultural misfit, it's much more difficult to fire them.
    - VexXtreme 12y ago
      Since the concept of "culture" is so vague and no one using it seems to be able to describe what exact set of criteria it represents, it appears to be whatever a hiring manager wants it to be. If you don't like someone's skin color, religion, cultural background, the fact that they don't like drinking or going to team-building trips every weekend, or you just don't like the color of their shirt, it's easy to reject them on the grounds of not being a "culture fit". Who cares about their professional skillset when you're obviously looking for a paid buddy. Curb your hubris and start treating people like human beings. I've worked for a number of "world changing" startups managed by 20-something year olds like you and the fact that it always devolved into a high school popularity contest made me sick to my stomach.

nostrademons 12y ago

Ex-Googler here, now working on my own startup. I had weeks at Google with 14 hour days and time in on the weekends. I also had weeks where I worked 4-6 hours/day and put away the phone & laptop on the weekend, or even ducked out at 2:30 on a Friday afternoon so I could celebrate my anniversary with my girlfriend. I appreciate the sentiment of the article, but there's a lot of complexity to the issue that it ignores. For one, most of the time that I was working crazy hours was because I a.) wanted and b.) needed to. I believed in the project's mission, the work was fun & challenging, and there was a lot to do that just wouldn't get done if I didn't put in the hours. Similarly, when I worked very light hours, it was because there wasn't much work that I had to do. I was blocked on other teams, or in-between projects and my manager didn't have a good idea where I'd be productive at the moment, or "held in reserve" so that if we needed to react quickly to market opportunities I'd be well-rested and not occupied by other projects. Working hard is not always a bad thing, or onerous, or exhausting. Sometimes employees work hard because they believe in what they're doing and want to do a good job; that's part of what makes a company a good place to work, after all. And sometimes it is, and creates a very unhealthy competition where everybody tries to outdo each other. I think that one of the things that Google in general and Larry Page in particular realizes is that people will have different desires for work/life balance at different stages in their life, and that within a large company, there should be places that can accommodate everyone from the achievement-oriented new Ph.D grad to the family with a young kid.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
pauleastlund 12y ago
This was my experience at Google as well. I was there a little over five years. There were times when I was completely in love with my team and my project and I was working until 3AM and feeling great about what I was getting done. There were times when I was burnt out or dealing with personal/medical issues and not contributing nearly that much. I can't complain about how I was treated in either circumstance. Beyond my own experience, I had multiple teammates who had long commutes and family commitments and made a rigid practice of leaving before five every single day. As far as I know, none of them were ever given any trouble about it. Maybe they weren't promoted as fast as if they'd burned the midnight oil, but that seems like a fair trade.

WalterBright 12y ago

I work for myself. The only problem is my boss is incompetent.

seivan 12y ago
Mine doesn't seem to be able to make a decision and settle for it.
zerr 12y ago
Walter, I still don't know how you make money :)
gonzo 12y ago
Bill Joy used to say that the number of bright employees in a company was the log of the number of employees. He would then explain that he had not expressed the base, which could be different on a company by company basis. Though he never expressed the result for the self-employed, log(1) = 0 in any base.
- WalterBright 12y ago
  I'm certain that my company has one Bright employee in it.

ryan90 12y ago

This topic is very valid, but far to complex and nuanced to be addressed in a single article. Long hours at Google? Please. The long hours argument would certainly hold up at many of the other companies on the list, however. Point being that no generalization can define why these rankings are misleading (though they certainly can be).

michaelochurch 12y ago

Different take on this: being perceived as "the cultural leader" is actually detrimental to a company. Let's take Google as an example, although any large company with a strong reputation would do. Take technical or cultural or managerial attribute Q (say, which programming language to privilege). Ask "what is the best Q option for Google?" Most people will admit that they don't know. There are lot of variables. Ask "what is the best Q option for the cultural leader? Suddenly you get a bunch of bikeshedding product executives trying to throw their weight around. Now that it's not "Google" being discussed but "the cultural leader" hanging in the balance, peoples' opinions get much more entangled and politicized (if less relevant to the specific needs of the company, Google). The concept of "the cultural leader" in technology is flawed and dangerous and it attracts people for the wrong reasons. You should hire the people who want to make a cultural leader by doing great work and, um, leading... not people who want to hold high positions at an organization already recognized for leadership.

trhway 12y ago

best places i worked at i'd not call a "Best Place to Work" as it was about successful work and not about being a "Best Place". Currently i work at a typical BigCo, mindless work, mindless management, one of those highest rated "Best Places to Work" for those who care :)

xigency 12y ago

From interviewing at Google, I had a really robotic impression of employees and life there. The entire process was disorganized. I drove four hours across the state to get there, navigating all sorts of construction, and found my own accommodations. When I arrived on site I was repeatedly asked to solve the same Java/C problems on whiteboards for a new person each time. No one bothered to ask me what made me unique or interesting, even though I have amazing stories to tell from traveling around the world and from projects I've worked on in the past. The free lunch thing is sort of over-blown, when you have to fill out a form and shout over a line of people to get a BLT sandwich made. And then there were a bunch of bicycles strewn out across the campus, mostly toppled over, for no explicable reason. Honestly, the only reason I would want to work there is for the money, and for that reason employees should not really expect to enjoy their time there.

duaneb 12y ago
An interview is a fairly terrible way to get to know a company's culture. Among other things, the interview is a filter, not an employment conversation.
- xigency 12y ago
  At the end of the interview I was left alone in an office where an employee showed up and thought I was there to interview him. Still, I understand your point.
  - swampthing 12y ago
    Out of curiosity, why would an existing employee think anyone would be interviewing him?
    - xigency 12y ago
      He was waiting to use a conference room and misheard me.
      - 12y ago

defenestration 12y ago

Quote from article: "But these lists don’t really measure something even more important: the quality of their employees’ lives." But the article isn't showing that the quality of life at lower ranked companies is better. In the end you are responsible for your own quality of life. You can achieve amazing things at Google, Facebook, etc, but it comes at a price. Key question is: what do you value most?

bane 12y ago

I work for a "best place to work". Before that I worked at a place I could charitably call a "bottom place to work". I've worked at a few very mediocre places as well. So I've been around the block so to speak. About a decade and a half ago, I worked at a place that doesn't show up on any of these lists. The main day-to-day difference it seems from where I work now and this place I worked at long ago is that I get free candy and juice. The other place had more interesting work. Almost all of my professional acquaintances come from the former place. We have a badass cafeteria, but I still have to pay for it. So I guess that's better than the Amazon gig and the mediocre to decent food I was offered? One of the chefs here is a former Google executive chef, his Polenta with mushroom sauce is pretty good, but a bit tart. I get whatever hardware and resources I've asked for so far. So far I've gotten a large format printer with staff, 3 developers, a new rMBP with top of the line specs, a new monitor, travel expensed and have $100k worth of rack mountable GPUs on order. I'm throwing a lot of people and hardware at a problem that everybody including the client thinks should be solved this way, but for <reasons> probably won't work out in the end...and we all know it. I've found not-for-profits to be consistently decent places to work, plus I can take pride in working at them for all kinds of principled reasons. Even if the pay sucks, the offices tend to be nice and its nice knowing you're helping the species move forward a little every day. The unofficial motto where I work is "fuck the money, do the right thing by the client". I like that. But I know from long-timers that work-life balance kind of sucks and there's been some lean times recently that have left some old-timers hungry with a thirst they can't quite get rid of. There's a yoga class I can take, $60/season. We have a Gym, the showers are cleaned twice a day. I've found that for-profits make me a heck of a lot more money, but range from miserable to mediocre. I've almost worked at Google, Amazon and a few other bright stars on these kinds of lists, but the problems didn't seem terribly interesting even if the cafeterias were cool. I guess pushing ads, on-line retail or some other kind of kool-aidery is hip. I like my Android phone well enough. Maybe if I could have taken that salary and moved cross country and displaced my life, the free catered meals would have been worth it. The quiz-show interview was lame and completely irrelevant for the job they wanted me to do. I've interviewed with a few places that think they're best places to work. 3 catered meals a day, game room, casual dress code, whatever. It's fine, but then they're supporting 10 year old application cruft and the hardest problems they have to solve is supporting the new release of Java. The most I've ever learned, and thus the most rewarding job I ever worked was for a small and scrappy startup that failed. The lessons I learned there have earned me nonstop promotions at better places. I would absolutely do that again if I had a time machine even though it had really sucky aspects to it. It didn't even come close to being a best place to work...though I also got free candy and juice. The best problems I've ever worked was for a shitty shitty mega-corp. They sent me around the world 4 times in two years, to active war zones, where I got shot at. Coding under fire is amazing. Saving people's lives is amazing. Dealing with corporate bullshit back home where none of that is recognized for any reason sucks. I recently was contacted by an employee to answer questions about code I hacked out 7 years ago while I was taking mortar fire. The stories I'll tell my grandkids come from this job. Also not a best place to work. No free juice or candy, no cafeteria. It's interesting McKinsey is in the top-10. I've only ever heard terrible things about working there. The average rate of burn-out is under 2 years for new hires, so the suck factor must be incredibly high. But then again, a McKinsey bullet on your resume opens lots of doors. In-N-Out and Costco are probably great to work if you don't have options. But I definitely need more than $12/hr for the lifestyle I've become accustomed to. I know of Googlers who take month-long spur of the moment vacations 3 times a year and keep advancing. I know others who are on-call and put in hard 14-16 hour days constantly and fight with their managers for their pay increases. It really is relative. If the work doesn't interest you, or the politics suck, or you like getting paid on time, and that matters to you more than anything else, then you might have a terrible time. You want dry-cleaning, catered lunches and work-life balance? Then maybe this list is a good one for you. Google does have interesting problems, but it's likely that you won't be working on them.

hw 12y ago

Question of whether a place is 'good to work at' is pretty much subjective. Some might argue Google is a great place to work given the perks, benefits and compensation. Others might avoid big companies like Google where working long hours is the norm and is in fact recommended (if you want to get out in front of your peers). Others might like companies with less perks, but a great work culture, where there's less focus on facilities but more focus on the having great work / life balance and culture. It's tough to find a company that has both =\