
Get that job at Google - comatose_kid
http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/03/get-that-job-at-google.html
======
cperciva
_Everyone else who came to Google was in the exact same position as you are,
modulo a handful of famous people with beards that put Gandalf's to shame, but
they're a very tiny minority. Everyone who applied had the same reasons for
not applying as you do. And everyone here says: "GOSH, I SURE AM HAPPY I CAME
HERE!" So just apply already._

And here, my friends, we have a wonderful example of something which
statisticians call a "biased sample". Of course the people who (a) were
offered a job by Google, (b) accepted said offer from Google, and (c) haven't
quit, are happy about having interviewed at Google.

If Steve Yegge had (a) gone to Facebook and interviewed ex-googlers, (b)
phoned people who were offered jobs but decided not to accept them (yes, we do
exist), or (c) talked to people who flew across the country to interview at
Google but weren't offered jobs, he would probably hear a rather more
complicated story.

~~~
gruseom
_people who were offered jobs but decided not to accept them (yes, we do
exist)_

I'll bite. Did you refuse a job offer from Google? If so, would you tell us
why?

~~~
cperciva
_Did you refuse a job offer from Google?_

Yes.

 _If so, would you tell us why?_

Several reasons, in no particular order: 1. The interview process was
completely and utterly broken; among other things, Google changed their mind
about which position I was applying for 3 times without consulting me. 2. The
job offer (for a position which would have required that I move from Canada to
the US) arrived shortly after the US Senate voted away the right of Habeas
Corpus. 3. I was interested in developing a system for online encrypted
backups, and I was talking to someone who told me that his boss would be
interested in licensing some of my work (the licensing didn't end up happening
-- a draft MOU ended up arriving two months late which was completely
different to what had been discussed in person -- but I decided to go ahead
with my work anyway). 4. While I was told that my suggested choice of research
projects "would be ok" (I was offered a research position), there was a clear
lack of enthusiasm for it; and similarly I had no enthusiasm for the fields of
research Google's director of research mentioned.

In short, they screwed up the recruiting process; the job location wasn't
ideal; I had another interesting option; and our interests didn't fit very
well.

~~~
edw519
"shortly after the US Senate voted away the right of Habeas Corpus"

I guess you would have blamed Google if it had rained that day too.

~~~
cperciva
_I guess you would have blamed Google if it had rained that day too._

I don't blame Google for the US Senate's lack of backbone, either. However,
the legal situation, my dislike for what I saw of Silicon Valley weather (I
like humidity), and the urban sprawl were all factors in my deciding that it
wasn't an environment I would enjoy.

~~~
edw519
"US Senate's lack of backbone"

Take this argument to reddit, please.

(Of course, if this gets downmodded immediately, then we'll all know that
won't be necessary. Reddit has arrived here.)

~~~
cperciva
_Take this argument to reddit, please._

Someone asked why I didn't accept a job at Google; I answered.

I don't come here to debate politics, but I don't think politics are
automatically off-topic here -- particularly when they influence questions
like "should I move to Silicon Valley?" or "should I launch a startup
company?".

~~~
davidw
The problem is that, as you can easily see from the results, what _was_ a
fascinating look at one person's experience with Google has degraded into a
relatively uninteresting tit-for-tat session, which does not reflect well on
anyone.

I'm not sure what to say really... you answered honestly and certainly weren't
concentrating on that aspect of it. Perhaps the best thing is if people have
the fortitude to not respond to politically themed things even if they
strongly disagree.

~~~
edw519
It wasn't the politics I challenged. It was the business logic. You aren't
going to conduct business with an entity in a given country because another
entity in that country did something you disagree with? Then it looks like
you'll never be doing any business with anyone ever.

This is a place where we hackers get together to encourage each other to
leverage our technological (and other) skills to build great businesses. When
someone posts a remark like that, it needs to be challenged. Left
unchallenged, it stands as "accepted".

(Funny, OP won't go to google because of the actions of the U.S. Senate, but
still chooses to conduct that argument in a forum which is based in the U.S.
Logic, please?)

~~~
davidw
<http://xkcd.com/386/> :-)

------
menloparkbum
Google is now a great place to go if you have a communications or marketing
degree from a 2nd tier school. Every other woman I meet in the Bay Area is a
Google account PM with a master's in marketing from some place like Maryland
State university. I would say if you aren't an engineer google is AWESOME:
free food, gym, haircuts, massage, shuttle buses, personal laptop, off-site
retreats to disneyland every other month, etc. The other employment options
for people in those positions usually resemble "the office." If you are an
engineer you will be working 3 people to a cube on maintenance tools that
maintain the tools for maintaining another tool.

I also turned down Google's offer. And as others have mentioned, various
Google recruiters still send me email at least three times a month.

------
aswanson
Who cares about a gig there? You think in 95 the founders there were reading
"Get that Job At Microsoft"? I think Yegge has written some decent stuff in
the past (in -v mode, of course) but I doubt most of HN is interested in
joining the cult. Anybody that says "GOSH, I SURE AM HAPPY" while reporting to
a cube has something wrong with them.

Build something new.

~~~
rglullis
_Build something new_

Easier said than done, no?

Not to mention that if you think that no one is able to produce interesting
work in a company like Google, than I'd say that you'd need to get out of the
HN groupthink.

~~~
aswanson
_Easier said than done, no?_

What isn't?

 _than I'd say that you'd need to get out of the HN groupthink_

I'd say that my thoughts are mine and mine alone, and you are free to get out
and apply to the big G if it suits you.

------
henning
Counterpoint from a bitter ex-Googler:
[http://valleywag.com/366983/ex+googler-vents-google-
recruite...](http://valleywag.com/366983/ex+googler-vents-google-recruiters-
are-out-of-touch)

However, he's clearly suggesting that classic, relatively timeless material on
data structures and algorithms along with a little bit of theory of
computation is at the heart of computer science, which is important if you
want to do software development, and you'll get no argument from me there.

------
sah
_Everything else I've mentioned you should know cold [...]_

 _You have a lot of warming up to do. Real-world work makes you rusty._

Those quotes make it sound like Google's interview process is biased toward
people who know a lot of basic-CS trivia. If real-world work makes you rusty,
doesn't that imply that the interview is favoring people who have studied up
on certain things such that they know them better than they actually need to?
I would agree that a good candidate should have been familiar with the details
of everything Yegge mentions at some point. But is there really much value in
knowing these things "cold", rather than merely knowing them "warm"?

~~~
utnick
yea I don't really see the point of memorizing CS trivia when

A) I can google it if I ever need to know B) Most languages today have support
for graphs, trees, and sorts, and other cs trivia things built in or via
stable libraries

It seems like a potential employee's ability to 'get things done' would be
more important

~~~
menloparkbum
It isn't trivia. You can "get things done" a lot faster when you don't have to
A) google all week for the answer or B) try out multiple half-baked
implementations.

I don't have an issue with Gooogle's requirement to know what you are doing,
but unfortunately I think the interesting jobs at Google are becoming few and
far between.

~~~
sah
I feel like there is a focus on what I would call trivial details built into
the assumption that a good candidate should be able to explain how _all_ of
these things work in an interview. There's a huge difference between not
knowing why you might want to keep a binary tree balanced and not knowing how
red/black trees work off the top of your head. If you've heard of them and
know what they're good for, you can look them up in a few seconds when you
need them.

Of course, a talented hacker will know the details of _some_ data structures
and algorithms. I'd be far more impressed with a candidate who could tell me
in detail about recent uses of a couple more unusual data structures and
algorithms than with a candidate who knew all the classics in detail but
nothing unusual.

------
billroberts
I don't think I could pass Steve's interview - that's why I had to start my
own company :-) Hmm, I wonder if I should sack myself...

------
nickb
If you really wanna work at Google, why not build something cool and possibly
get bought out by Google instead? Better than trying to join through this
(broken?) interview process.

Personally, I'd rather not have 10 different bosses above me... but that's
just me.

~~~
rms
Anything that puts me that low on an organizational chart is incredibly
unappealing to me. The conventional corporate path of becoming a director
after working really hard seems crazy to me. And forget about becoming an
executive.

~~~
copenja
I agree with you about joining low in the "org" chart being unappealing.

But the comment about having to "work really hard" to become a director
confuses me...

It seems all paths to extreme success involve hard work..

~~~
rms
Working really hard to become a couple steps down on an org chart is much less
appealing to me than working really hard and having a self-sustaining or
acquired business.

------
wallflower
Once you get hired by Google your expectations might not be met... There were
stories a while back of Ph.D's hired by Google expecting to work on cool
infrastructure/system architecture who find themselves instead working on
writing Javascript.

------
Emmjaykay
I never ever get past the first phone interview with them. I usually stumble
because I forgot some command-line switch or something. The last time they
called I said I didn't want to interview since the interviewers often are kind
of mean. :`(

------
anupamkapoor
this blog should come with an option to turn verbosity off.

~~~
jcl
A couple months ago, he wrote an article about how he thinks that the ideal
blog length is something that takes between 10 and 50 minutes to read, because
then more of it gets stored in your long-term memory. Not surprisingly, that
article is also quite lengthy:

[http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/01/blogging-
theory-201-...](http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/01/blogging-
theory-201-size-does-matter.html)

------
henning
I've heard that Google has really mixed, often shitty interviewing and this
just confirms the hearsay.

~~~
cperciva
_I've heard that Google has really mixed, often shitty interviewing and this
just confirms the hearsay._

My experience doesn't match that. I decided against accepting Google's offer,
but I can't find any fault with my interviewers; while there were a few
instances of "I know this is a lame question, but I'm supposed to ask it",
most of the questions I was asked were quite interesting -- and my
interviewers were clearly ready and eager to learn when I presented them with
solutions which were better than the "official" solutions they expected.

~~~
aston
That would be the positive half of the "mixed." I thought my interview process
was not so hot, personally. Not horrible, but not at all as good as yours.

------
0xdefec8
"For God's sake, don't try sorting a linked list during the interview."

Could someone explain that one to me? It's probably a sign I need to hit the
books.

------
prakash
The "Programming Interviews Exposed" book covers most of what Steve talks
about. <http://www.amazon.com/dp/047012167X/>

------
vlad
I am reading this on my iPhone. I scrolled through 10 "pages" and didn't see
any tips. All I learned was that google must hate apple.

------
tac-tics
What the fuck is with you people? 60 responses and most of theme seem to be
arguing about Steve's content instead of his average blog length. After all,
it's Yegge we're talking about folks!

=-P

