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Don Dodge: fired from Microsoft, hired by Google
- lionhearted 17y agoI remember a lesson I learned the hard way once. I'd put it something like, "Occasionally someone will get power over you or your organization that you didn't mean for them to have. Trying to make decisions as if they didn't have that power - just because you didn't mean for them to have it - will result in pain for you." Perhaps that could be said more elegantly, but it's oh-so-painfully true. Sometimes someone low in the org chart without a fancy title comes into a lot of respect, or becomes the face of the company, or becomes good friends with a supplier or major client. Like it or not, that makes it time to reward, promote, and retain them, even if they "shouldn't" have that power. Best case scenario you can be enlightened about it and try to bring out the best in them. This, this entry right here - this is the worst case scenario in action.
- dennisgorelik 17y agoDo you mean Microsoft didn't mean to give Don Dodge any power? I think Microsoft did a good thing by firing Don. It definitely turned out to be good for Don Dodge, Google, and our industry in general. But it might be good for Microsoft too: if organization is not ready for what one of her high-performers is doing -- it might be better to keep such high-performer out in order to keep the organization more consistent and less confused.
- lionhearted 17y ago> Do you mean Microsoft didn't mean to give Don Dodge any power? I think he became more significant than his official title, and they failed to realize that during their planning and layoffs.
- ilamont 17y agoWhat surprised me about this: 1) How quickly Google moved to contact him. Dodge is very knowledgeable (I've been reading his blog for years) but I also have to wonder if Google moves a little faster when high-profile Microsoft employees are involved. 2) how long it took him to switch from Internet Explorer and Windows Mobile.
- apu 17y agoWith regards to (1), I'm sure they do, especially considering the negative PR Microsoft was accruing for this lay-off. With one stroke, you get a good guy working for you and you make your competitor look bad. Win-win.
- mrduncan 17y agoI also have to wonder if Google moves a little faster when high-profile Microsoft employees are involved I would imagine that they move quickly when high-profile employees of any (tech) company are involved, not just Microsoft. Being a big competitor to Google pretty much by-definition means that they will have a few high-profile people who leave regularly. I'm sure the same pattern is true of Google picking up ex-Yahoo employees.
- wglb 17y agoThe fellow he is going to work for, Vic Gundotra, was a long-term Microsoft guy, and so it would seem that he was aware of Don and worked quickly to snap him up.
- onewland 17y agoWith regards to (2), I can't believe he wasn't using Firefox/Chrome/Safari/Opera. I work at a (non-web based) MS shop, and even there you'd be hard-pressed to find a developer or hacker type who touches IE. Those who do use IE are only using it to test IE compatibility.
- lowkey 17y agoDon_Dodge, Google = +1,+1 for class. Microsoft = -2
- tom_rath 17y agoLaid off, not fired. That might sound pedantic, but there's a big difference between the two.
- dennisgorelik 17y agoWhen high-profile person is "laid off" it's more appropriate to call it "fired". Or would you say that it was simply a matter of cost-cutting?
- jacquesm 17y agoYou don't normally 'lay off' people in that bracket. Either they leave or you fire them. Lay-offs are for people a lot lower on the totem pole. It's harsh, but that is how it is.
- tom_rath 17y agoYou do lay off at that level if there's a mis-match between what a company is wanting and what the person was hired to deliver. If Microsoft's "evangelist" roles are changing, it makes sense to dismiss those folks who previously worked towards those old objectives, since those objectives are no longer being targeted. One is 'fired' due to incompetence. Another is 'laid off' due to a change in company priorities, direction and resource allocation.
- icefox 17y agoThey do lay off whole groups in which case you have a bunch of managers and vp pondering what to do.
- wallflower 17y agoOne of my parents was laid-off years ago because they wanted to get rid of one guy, a VP (so they closed his entire group)
- krschultz 17y agoThats simply not true. I know a guy who was the president of a division with >80m in revenue a year, and was "laid off" with 5,000 other people after 28 years with the company and never a negative performance review. His boss went to bat with finance people but lost. There is a formula and sometimes it says people at level X can't be paid greater than Y, and if they get paid greater than Y, they are laid off. Often the reason they are paid greater than Y is because they are good at the job. Not a smart way to do layoffs, but becoming more common because it is easier to fire top down than bottom up a lot of times.
- dschobel 17y agoI find it weird that he's so transparent about "company X pays me now, company X's products are SO much better than anything I've used in the past". Is this stuff compelling to engineers who care about technical merit rather than who is paying his salary?
- icey 17y agoWhen a girl breaks up with you, you want to be sure she knows that the new one is way, way hotter. And smarter. And frankly has better friends.
- davidw 17y agoYeah, that actually took a little something away from the article, for me. Glad that he has a job though.
- dschobel 17y agoYeah, it's a happy ending for sure. It seems like everyone who has ever met the guy likes him.
- dennisgorelik 17y agoFor me more surprising thing was that Don didn't even try Gmail while working for Microsoft.
- 17y ago
- jacquesm 17y agoThis is on the homepage twice now: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=943919 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=943919
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- char 17y agoWhat I find incredible is that this guy is just now discovering Gmail and Google Docs. Wow.
- byrneseyeview 17y agoI bet this is the last time Microsoft tries to have someone do what Don Dodge does -- it must suck for him to enumerate all the Microsoft products he only used (touted?) because they paid him to do it. If I worked at Google, I would really reconsider this -- how will it look if Zoho makes him an offer next?
- dennisgorelik 17y agoWell, if Google fires Don then may be Zoho will make him offer next week?
- diptanu 17y agoIs he in the marketing team at Google??? Seriously, his blog post beats the hard-core Google Fanboys!
- chris100 17y agoYes, he lost quite a bit of credibility today. He can't find any flaw to google docs as a replacement to Office? I sure can. I'm not able to use Google Docs as a replacement for Word and Powerpoint yet when I'm doing precise positioning of elements. I'd like to use Google Docs, but it's just too limited for my needs.
- ilamont 17y agoI like Google Docs, but wait til Dodge wants to track changes in a shared word processing document. Fine-toothed footer/header tweaks are also far better in Word.
- neurotech1 17y agoI thought his comments were more directed at the advantages of web based Google Documents over Office 2007. I use both Google Docs and Office 2007 on my PC, depending on my needs for a particular document, eg. if I want to access it from multiple computers - Google Docs is great.
- growt 17y agoFirst Vint Cerf, now Don Dodge. Am I the only one who thinks google hires people 'by name'. At least for the evangelist positions (what ever that means).
- pchristensen 17y agoWouldn't evangelist be the position where you most want to hire a 'name'?
- jlees 17y agoAye, though it only works when people have actually heard of the name. I had no idea who Don Dodge was.
- mark_l_watson 17y agoI don't know Don Dodge, but he seems to be a very cool guy, and the tone of his microsoft-fu (get the joke :-) seemed just right.
- willwagner 17y agoFrom the article: "That fast decisive action was refreshing, and such a contrast to the slow, secretive, bureaucracy at Microsoft. That speed and decisiveness also reflects different approaches to hiring great people, building great products and serving customers well." I am really not trying to be disparaging to Google, but is this really true in Google's hiring practices in general? I know they can snap up big names in a hurry, which Microsoft has also done in the past, but from the outside looking in, it seems like their hiring process is slow and consensus based, and from what I hear, you don't even know what group you'll be working in until late in the process. For some people, that can look "slow, secretive, and bureaucratic". I'm not saying it's the wrong approach for Google, but it is what it is.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- khangtoh 17y agoHe wasn't fired but let go. It's a world of difference between the two.
- gfodor 17y agoDon's going to regret writing this. This post drops a nuclear weapon on any bridge, no matter how fragile, that led from Mountain View back to Redmond. Edit: removed the last part, it was a bit uncalled for. My bad.