
Google rescinds candidate verbal offer due to low GPA - Puer
https://www.reddit.com/r/cscareerquestions/comments/a1xqeo/verbal_offer_rescinded_due_to_gpa/
======
Puer
I just read this post and thought it was a really shitty move on Google's
part. For those that don't know, as part of Google's initial application you
have to submit an "unofficial" transcript. This means that Google had this
person's transcript through the entirety of the interview process from
beginning to end, but only after extending them a verbal offer did they decide
to inform them they can't hire because of their low GPA.

The coding challenges and whiteboard interviews are ridiculous enough as is.
It makes me sad to see such a lack of courtesy, though. If the GPA was going
to be the barrier they should have just rejected the candidate outright from
the beginning and not wasted their time.

~~~
anon2775
Yup. I have a horrible GPA due to a bunch of personal and disability stuff but
they never look at it due to experience. If they did, I wouldn't want to work
somewhere that favors GPA and/or nonsense certifications. In fact when I hire,
I measure candidates inversely proportionate to their list of certs.

~~~
virgilp
That's an equally bad heuristic for rejecting someone.

~~~
derangedHorse
An "inversely" bad heuristic lol

------
elhudy
I think we're missing a big part of the story here.

>[I] was asked to write a statement justifying my lower than usual gpa (2.6)
and a week later i was informed that the offer committee was unable to give me
an offer.

What if it wasn't the gpa that turned them off, but the statement he wrote?
I'm imagining something along the lines of "Well my GPA was bad because my
professors weren't very good and I also partied too hard, but I've come to
know better now.". It sounds like they really wanted to give him a chance, but
he blew that statement.

~~~
Puer
> "Was adjusting moving across the continent for school in fields I were not
> familiar with in highschool. Balancing real life responsibilities and
> focused on a lot of extra curriculars. Grades within my major were good and
> it has been upward trending."

> "I have rarely gotten Cs actually for some reason, especially not my major
> classes. Either way, i don't see how this disqualifies me from the job as it
> was not in the job description to have a high GPA, and I passed my
> interviews reasonably well."

Of course it's possible that the OP isn't telling the complete truth, but he's
been a regular poster in that sub throughout the process so I doubt he's
making much up. Also, if it really is based on your explanation that's just
encouraging dishonesty and is a shitty hiring metric. If you're going to hire
on something as arbitrary as GPA then the reason behind the number shouldn't
be a factor. "We're sorry, we only accept candidates with low GPA if _both_
parents died, but as only one of yours did during your undergrad we can't move
on with your app."

~~~
esrauch
If someone has a 2.6 gpa then can it be actually be that C's were rare? It
seems like he'd likely have ~40% of his grades be C's right?

~~~
cellularmitosis
Mostly A’s and B’s with a few scattered F’s can really drag a GPA down. At
some universities, the cutoff for deciding to drop a course can happen only a
few weeks into the semester... sometimes F’s happen :(

~~~
Gibbon1
Mine the cutoff was 2 class days.

------
influx
Ummm?

"Google doesn't even ask for GPA or test scores from candidates anymore,
unless someone's a year or two out of school, because they don't correlate at
all with success at the company. Even for new grads, the correlation is
slight, the company has found."

[https://www.businessinsider.com/how-google-hires-
people-2013...](https://www.businessinsider.com/how-google-hires-
people-2013-6)

~~~
SatvikBeri
I've repeatedly heard statements from people at Google contradicting what Bock
says about the process. Here's one public response from Gayle Laakmann
McDowell (author of Cracking the Coding interview):
[https://www.quora.com/Why-doesn%E2%80%99t-Google-care-
about-...](https://www.quora.com/Why-doesn%E2%80%99t-Google-care-about-hiring-
top-college-graduates)

~~~
joshschreuder
Also Eric Schmidt said as much in a recent Conversations With Tyler [1]:

> The recruiting started off as informal, but it ultimately became very, very
> structured. We were famously focused on the school you went to and your GPA
> and not your experience.

[1] [https://medium.com/conversations-with-tyler/eric-schmidt-
tyl...](https://medium.com/conversations-with-tyler/eric-schmidt-tyler-cowen-
google-ec33aa3e6dae)

------
anon123931
I also made it all the way through "hiring committee" at Google but failed at
"final hiring committee" ostensibly due to my low GPA (well in my case, decent
overall GPA but a couple of shockingly low grades).

Main difference in my case is no verbal offer. My recruiter made it clear that
the team wanted to hire me, but that I had to be approved by "final hiring
committee" as the last step.

For this Reddit poster, it seems like the recruiter really messed up / broke
protocol by making a verbal offer. (That, or the protocol has changed; my
experience was 7 years ago).

~~~
jayd16
Verbal offer could meany anything. For all we know he got a "it looks very
likely we'll move forward" and got way too excited.

------
gigatexal
It’s college. You’re a kid. You do stupid crap. Then you get to the real world
and you realize life isn’t college and you have to hustle. You get a GitHub
account and you self teach. You get internships or junior positions. You give
everything. You build up a good network and a body of work that is compelling.
The FANG companies even relax the requirements for college degrees if one has
a lot of experience and drive — and then the this. Goes to show some companies
are very willing to miss out on great candidates in order to be extra careful
not to hire the one slacker. What a shame.

------
spunker540
I recently went through the hiring process at google and after the two pre-
interview calls with HR, one full day of interviews and 4 follow up calls for
team matching (matched with a team) as well as additional calls with hr to
discuss compensation (where I was pressured to divulge competing offers) I
didn’t pass the hiring committee. I think their process in general is not very
considerate. Most of my interviewers barely introduced themselves, talked
about what they do, or asked me anything about my experience. I also found out
the day of my interview I was being considered for “l3” which is entry-level
despite my 4 years of industry experience and was told it’s too late to change
that and to be considered for a higher level I’d need to re-interview.

~~~
Skunkleton
FWIW, I had a very similar interview process with google. First time I
interviewed I didn't make it through committee. They called me back a year
later and said that it was because all of the positions had filled (which
seems suspect to me).

In general, no one that I interacted with is someone who I would have wanted
to work with.

------
jammygit
I was talking to a Facebook rep at my schools career fair recently. He told me
that they will interview anyone with a GPA over 2 provided that think the
person will pass the difficult interviews. I'm not keen to work at Facebook,
but it was a nice attitude to hear.

------
jancsika
Thought experiment:

1\. Candidate interviews and gets to the final rung of the ladder.

2\. Name of candidate gets input into Google's "Final Rung" algorithm.

3\. The "Final Rung" algorithm cross checks the candidate's name against all
of that candidate's data from the Googleverse.

4\. What the algorithm checks for is a black box to the hiring team. Only "1"
or "0" is output.

5\. Google then either accepts the candidate or goes back through the
application looking for "clues" for why the algo output a "0".

What is the argument for Google _not_ doing what I just described above?

~~~
munchbunny
The argument is Google should put said "Final Rung" algorithm up at step 0
(which would be entirely possible for a GPA issue). Alternatively, Google
should not give a verbal offer until the "Final Rung" algorithm returns a 1.

~~~
anticensor
Initial rung would be too noticeable.

~~~
munchbunny
You don't have to point out that it's about GPA. You ask for resume +
references + transcript and just reject the initial application. The resume
screen stage is extremely noisy, it wouldn't be obvious.

------
dmoy
Reading this, it sounds like they got shot down by SVP (passed HC, got match).
Of course, I have no idea of that was the case here for sure. But it does
happen.

Recruiter should not have given verbal offer before there was actually a
contract sent though, that is a really bad look.

------
curuinor
Verbal offer is worth the paper it's written on.

~~~
yjftsjthsd-h
Is it? I was given to understated that, legally, contracts can be binding with
only verbal agreement.

~~~
77pt77
They are (with caveats), the problem is proving it.

~~~
anticensor
Two witnesses agreeing each other are usual standard for verbal contract
disputes.

------
fhdhehfhzhe
Yall remember this from less than a month ago?
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18374938](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18374938)

~~~
akhilcacharya
That article struck me (and the Googlers I sent it to) be incredibly naive and
condescending, fwiw.

------
WalterBright
If I was going to invest $$$$$ in someone, I'd like an explanation for a poor
GPA. For example, these are all good:

1\. had a health crisis

2\. the grades started out poor, but steadily rose and was getting A's by
senior year

3\. took the toughest classes in the school, not the easy A's

4\. had a full time job to pay the tuition

Some not so good answers:

1\. whatever, dunno

2\. trust me, I'm good

I wouldn't want to invest in someone who would pay about as much attention to
their work as they did to their grades.

After all, if it was your money, would you?

~~~
aylmao
I think this slightly misses the point though. It's not really that they check
GPA, it's that they really messed this guys plans by taking his transcript at
the beginning but not checking it until after giving him a verbal offer.

I myself have had negative experiences with the Google recruiting and offer
process. I have friends and know people who have had Google recruiting horror
stories. Everything from recruiters being over 30 mins late for final
interview rounds (which throws off everything), to people being promised one
office location but actually be given another after they sign, to the pressure
"interns" with non-guaranteed host-matching offers go through. That host-
matching system in which students might get a Google internship offer "but not
really, cause we'll see if there's a team for you" is honestly not only
demeaning, but outright cruel to college students who have to turn down other
offers and add that huge weight into the already excruciating stress of
school.

Overall I got the sense that Google simply knows it has the leverage and the
desirability-- which is true for a lot of SV companies-- but they actually
leverage that in their favour by playing the candidate in the way that best
suits their needs.

I honestly hope any Google employees reading this raise the issue internally.
Once you're out of college it's easy to forget, but stuff like this is very
stressing and a huge downer for college kids. And it can be better-- I
honestly haven't heard of a company that has so many "recruiting errors" as
Google.

~~~
WalterBright
I'm neither defending nor criticizing Google's procedures, just what I'd do if
evaluating with a candidate with a marginal GPA, and it was my money on the
line.

------
tdb7893
Did they say it was GPA related or was that purely speculation? There's a
bunch of stuff that can sink an offer and nowhere that I've done interviews
has GPA been the reason that late

~~~
Puer
100% GPA related.

> Repost from yesterday's daily chat thread.

> Hi guys, kinda a big issue rnow.

> Got matched with a host for SWE Internship with Big G this summer. Had the
> match interview and it was a match, recruiter told me last monday that i
> should receive my offer within 2 days.

​

> Didn't hear anything until yesterday, when she emailed me asking me to write
> a statement justifying my lower than usual GPA. (2.6)

​

> I am pretty nervous about this. I turned down two jobs this summer because I
> thought I had already been matched. I can't find much online abotu this
> situation. What happens now?

[https://www.reddit.com/r/cscareerquestions/comments/a13waz/b...](https://www.reddit.com/r/cscareerquestions/comments/a13waz/big_4_discussion_november_28_2018/ean3kzg/)

~~~
Zhenya
Wait wait wait a moment.

This isn't for a job, this is for an internship. These are different things
and internships are clearly scholastically linked.

------
aurizon
what if this person was 4.0 on all the tech topics, a brilliant person indeed,
but has no patience or interest in history, religious studdies, English etc
etc. This sounds like what Oracle would do. You dodged a bullet, onwards and
upwards...

~~~
darren_
As a googler I agree that passing on a "4.0 on all the tech topics, a
brilliant person indeed, but has no patience or interest in history, religious
studdies, English etc etc." is indeed google dodging a bullet.

~~~
aurizon
Ah, liberal arts, consume - not create - fits. These tech people come later to
the arts, they are the heart of our engineering and scientific achievements -
the Teslas. It is all well and good to create well socialized kids who grow up
into rounders but these people create little except harmony - bees or ants
fits...

------
Khaine
Dick move.

Don't be evil is definitely dead and buried at google

------
8bitsrule
"My gpa was high for two years, then I fell in love and realized that I was
young and missing out on life too much. I'm very good at prioritizing the
essentials and following through on my promises."

------
dbg31415
Very similar thing happened to me.

This was about 15 years ago, and I had joined a startup while I was in
college. I had started off with a 3.7 GPA my first 2 years, but eventually
work became more important to me than school, so I did everything I could to
just get a diploma as quickly as I could. I took a bunch of classes pass/fail,
got my advisor to help push forward credit for "independent studies," and eked
by with some Cs. (I graduated a 4 year program in 3 years.)

Despite the GPA slip, the Ivy League school I went to was quite happy with my
story and sent a reporter out to interview me for the graduation edition of
the paper calling me "one of their best and brightest" \-- I was grouped in
with about 10 other students in a class of 4k+. They cited the fact that I
paid my own way through school by working for a startup as something they felt
was impressive.

Fast forward a year. We sold the company, and I applied for a job at Google.
Did a few rounds, they went well, and people liked my story about working
while in school. I got flown out for interviews, they well -- got through the
questions about how many ping-pong balls would fit in an oil tanker, how to
divide loot on a pirate ship, and how many times a day do clock hands
overlap... And I got a verbal offer! The job was a little entry-level for me,
but I was pretty happy. I told the other places I was applying to that I was
going to Google.

Then I got a random call from someone who said, "Hey can you send us your
official transcript?" Since they had my unofficial transcript, and I had
already gotten the verbal offer, I didn't see what the harm was... figured it
was just a formality -- mostly because they said it was just a formality and
not to worry about it.

Anyway a week later I get an email, "We're sorry but we are passing on you...
blah blah." I called the guy who gave me the verbal offer... and was told, "We
can't hire anyone who has a sub-3.0 GPA." I had a 2.9 GPA.

So 15 years+ later, I'm still a bit bitter about that. Look, companies can
hire whomever they want, but as I get older I see very clearly that GPA is
just a conformity metric. It doesn't tell you how smart someone is, or how
talented or driven they are. A high GPA just tells you that someone knows how
to submit to authority, and put academics ahead of networking. (And a good
school typically just means a kid had wealthy parents.)

I think I'm doing OK without Google, but yeah... sucks that in a place that
prides itself on being amazingly intelligent that they still have red-tape
around what metrics can be used to define intelligence. Bezos said it well,
paraphrased: smart minds are flexible minds. Shame Google is still being rigid
on this sort of methodology.

* There's one clear sign Jeff Bezos looks for to gauge how smart people are | Business Insider || [https://www.businessinsider.com.au/jeff-bezos-sign-of-intell...](https://www.businessinsider.com.au/jeff-bezos-sign-of-intelligence-2018-10?r=US&IR=T)

------
jayd16
Someone jumped the gun and thought a verbal offer meant something. Is this
really worth discussing? Its not like we'll get the truth of what actually
happened or why.

------
akhilcacharya
If I were to guess it's because this was for Google EP, which focuses more on
academics as a part of the interview process than the algorithm portion.

------
rlyshw
This same thing happened to me from a large financial company on the east
coast, except I had received a written offer via email.

------
monksy
Google doesn't want the guy in their "cool kids" club because he doesn't have
the right number.

------
gcatalfamo
Weren’t they boasting about not looking at GPAs anymore?

------
jpeg_hero
I see what he’s saying, but come on 2.6?!?

~~~
uoflcards22
You realize GPA is a relative, not absolute, metric, right (i.e., a 2.6 is
considered ok for engineering students at top universities)?

~~~
akhilcacharya
> 2.6 is considered ok for engineering students at top universities

I don't know anywhere this is considered "ok". At my school my GPA was
considered just "Ok" at 3.9+.

~~~
sk5t
Grade inflation, look it up. If 3.9 is "OK" your class's grades have
compressed to the point of meaninglessness.

~~~
akhilcacharya
I think we had ~150 CS grads, and about 15 valedictorians with perfect 4.0's.

~~~
eeks
Either your promotion is made of geniuses or as @sk5t said your GPA is indeed
meaningless.

------
sys_64738
"Don't Be Evil"

