
Running a software team at Google - phenylene
http://matt-welsh.blogspot.com/2013/04/running-software-team-at-google.html
======
ultimoo
This is a nice article giving an insight into how it is working for one of the
most successful engineering companies of our time.

However, the OP comes from a strong academic background and Google is quite
hand-in-glove with premier universities and research institutes. Hence he
already has credibility inside of Google.

I however am told that it is quite an uphill task to join Google without an
already established credibility and get to work with their core set of
products. It'll be nice if someone could shed more light on this. I have
always been very curious about how it is working at Google. I mean except a
few, using Google products are such an everyday (everyhour?) thing for the
average software engineer.

~~~
endtime
>However, the OP comes from a strong academic background and Google is quite
hand-in-glove with premier universities and research institutes. Hence he
already has credibility inside of Google.

I don't think it really works that way. Being associated with a top school
helps a lot in getting an interview, but past that I don't think it helps with
anything at all (if I'm wrong, please let me know, I am missing out :) ).

~~~
sheri
It does help getting an interview, but can also help tilt the balance in tight
interview decisions. I presume it would be easier to make the case for folks
with degrees from elite schools.

~~~
Nitramp
Is that your actual experience on a Google hiring committee, or are you
guessing (can't tell from your comment)?

------
codeonfire
The real story with big tech workplaces is that everyone wants to be in
charge, everyone wants to establish credibility, no one wants to do the
coding. I see this all the time. "I'm a part time coder" to me gets
categorized with non-coder.

The fact is that from day one it's mental and political combat. Everyone is
telling everyone else they are a "lead" or building a team, or whatever.
Titles are meaningless as anyone can get their title changed to Sr tech lead
or some acronym. If you are a software engineer and want to call yourself a
lead manager all you have to do is blog about it and hope someone believes
you. All that matters is what you know, what you can do, and can you
manipulate perceptions enough to get credit for your own work. Having
"influence" just means you've found some people that don't understand these
thing yet or you got some dirt.

~~~
archangel_one
> "everyone wants to be in charge, everyone wants to establish credibility, no
> one wants to do the coding"

Have you worked at Google? My observation has been that most people here _do_
want to do the coding. Which is not to say that they don't want to be in
charge and establish credibility as well, but the culture is _much_ more
biased towards engineering than at many other companies.

~~~
codeonfire
Saying that you want to code while not coding is the oldest tactic in the
book. I have been hearing 'gee, I wish I could code' since the 90's. Keep in
mind I am talking about people who are hired specifically to create new
software, one part of which is software construction. The trick is to maintain
coder cred without revealing your true intentions or actually coding. The
company doesn't matter. Maybe Google has more than most that are still trying
to code, but I guarantee there are a ton of developers who are trying to
maintain the appearance.

------
seanmcdirmid
> It no longer comes down to making three grumpy program committee members
> happy with the font spacing in your paper submissions.

As anyone who has submitted a paper written in Word to a technical conference
knows: bad kerning over two columns will set your paper back at least one
letter grade. Must use Latex instead. (I'm sure he is just joking, but it
comes up...)

~~~
pseut
Honestly, every time I see a job market paper[1] written in Word I can't help
but think, "this person must have never worked on anything (mathematically)
hard, or needed to automate table generation, or..."

[1] on the off chance that the term is not widely known on HN, job applicants
for academic positions (in Economics, at least) send a draft of an (almost
always) unpublished paper as the main component of their job application.

~~~
binarycrusader
Anecdotally, I think you're wrong; I spent three years dealing with PhD people
in Economics. All of them used Microsoft Word; none used Latex. Many of them
were absolutely brilliant at maths.

Many of them were doing table generation using STATA and some scripting in MS
Office.

I don't think it's a stretch to believe that people could be brilliant in
maths, but not so great with computers.

~~~
pseut
What generation were they? I'm thinking of recent PhDs and I know only one or
two people working in technically difficult areas that don't use LaTeX. It's
possible that Word's equation editor has improved a lot since I last used it,
but typing up a proof is painful enough that it's going to force most people
to LaTeX (or Scientific Word or Lyx, or some other frontend) pretty quickly,
regardless of their computer literacy.

But I know that (for example) Hal White used a lot of Word and he's definitely
brilliant at math. I appreciate your anecdote and will rethink my biases. (I
do read these papers, though, and nothing's made me change my mind yet...)

~~~
binarycrusader
They were of mixed generations; most in their 30s, and a few older than that.

If I had to make a wild guess, I'd say it had to do with the fact that most of
them were from Asia. My gut feeling is that Latex has a bigger following in
the "western" world than the "eastern" one. Again, wild conjecture on my part;
especially since I have not yet spent any time in an Asian country myself.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
This is probably true, though in China/computer science, we are seeing
increased LaTeX usage. The problem is that LaTeX isn't that great of an
experience for writing papers in Chinese, which doesn't have the kerning
problems of western character sets anyways.

------
michaelochurch
_Most importantly, my team's success is no longer defined through an arbitrary
and often broken peer review process, which applies to pretty much everything
that matters in the academic world._

Oh boy. Don't even get me started on broken processes. When managers can use
secret calibration scores to blacklist reports and keep them captive for 5+
years on undesirable projects, what else should it be called exactly?

Matt Welsh was hired above the Real Googler Line, so he has a rosy-eyed view.
He's also comparing it against the nightmare of post-PhD academic politics. He
also seems, from his account, like a decent guy. He hasn't seen yet what
Google turns into for young engineers who don't have external credibility yet,
and who end up with managers who _aren't_ decent people... It'd be interesting
to read his opinion after he sees that.

If you're above the RGL (~10%) you have the credibility to represent your
contribution to the company independently. Peer review gets you promotions,
managers are a higher-ranking peer and can help you a little more, but you
have enough independent credibility above the RGL that you can't be extorted.
If you're below RGL, you have the extortive manager-as-SPOF nonsense of
typical rank cultures, and you get none of the upsides of working at Google.

Also, I think the TLM concept is broken. The whole reason closed allocation is
a fistful of fail is that, rather than resolving the conflict of interest
between project leadership and people management (the best thing for a person
might be to change projects) it tends to double down on that.

The only part of people management (aside from HR, at the company's interface)
that has any value for 120+ IQers doing convex work is the mentoring aspect...
which ought to be project-independent.

~~~
sheri
What is the Real Googlers Line? This is the first I'm hearing of it. I don't
work at Google though, so maybe this is well known.

~~~
michaelochurch
It's not an official designation, obviously. It's where your bozo bit starts.
If you're a Real Googler, people approach you with BozoBit := false.

Here's the Google engineering ladder:

    
    
        SWE 2 (fresh college graduate)
        SWE 3 (fresh PhD or 5+ years experience)
        Senior SWE (manager-equivalent; first acceptable "terminal" level.)
        Staff SWE (serious engineering chops)
        Sr. Staff SWE (rare; candidate for Director/Principal)
        Principal SWE (Director-equivalent)
        Distinguished SWE
        Eng. Fellow (VP equivalent)
    

I'd say that 5% of SWE 2-3 are Real Googlers, 35% of Senior are, and 85% of
Staff are.

Real Googler means you have freedom of the castle. If you want to work on
Search, you work on Search. If you want to dedicate the next 6 months to the
maintenance of a module on which your work depends, you do it. It's like an
open-allocation environment, and similar to what Google was before it got Too
Big.

Below the Real Googler Line, you actually sweat performance reviews because
your manager can unilaterally reduce your credibility to zero. Above it,
projects and managers compete for you. There's probably some room for play
(when you're slightly above RGL, you might still worry) but it has a binary
feel to it. When you're a Real Googler, you have independent credibility. You
don't sweat Perf.

Traditionally, the RGL was the Senior SWE tier. That was the level at which
you were trusted to choose projects, and even manage if it were needed.

You're expected to make Sr. SWE in 3 years from SWE 3 and 5 years from SWE 2.
If you don't, it's like being denied tenure and your project options (which
probably weren't great, since 99% of getting promoted is getting on the right
projects) continue to decline.

If you have Real Googler credibility, you can get away with _a lot_. There are
people who start strong and get promoted, then go along for 3+ years without
committing any code before they get fired. That's what RG gets you: a 3-year
audit cycle. On the other hand, if you're not above the RGL, while it's not
technically speaking _hard_ to stay employed, it's extremely competitive to
get into a position where you can have a real impact.

~~~
wging
michaelochurch, I don't see an 'SWE 1' there. You also don't take into account
what I've heard about 'slotting'. Are these two related?

~~~
acchow
There is no SWE 1. Google doesn't believe anyone they hire is below a SWE 2.

~~~
jfasi
There is in fact a SWE 1 title, but it's reserved for interns.

