this post was submitted on 24 Nov 2023
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'Morale is at an all-time low': Ex-Googler writes scathing latter slamming layoffs and 'eroded' culture::An ex-Googler wrote a 1,500-word letter criticizing the firm and CEO Sundar Pichai's lack of "visionary leadership."

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[–] hightrix@lemmy.world 198 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Is anyone surprised? Brilliant engineers going to work at Google expecting to work on world changing software and instead work on selling more ads.

How miserable.

[–] 1rre@discuss.tchncs.de 13 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Selling more ads can actually be engaging to work on even if it's not world changing, if you're given things you actually need to think through

Unfortunately I can't really see Google being the type of place that lets people think for themselves, they're far too busy trying to please the shareholders for that

[–] hightrix@lemmy.world 31 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Oh agreed, the scale and performances requirements to serve ads on the modern internet is a really challenging problem.

My point was simply that these brilliant minds are being wasted on this objective.

[–] TheDarkKnight@lemmy.world 16 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Ugh I’d feel so fucking gross is I somehow contributed to the proliferation of MORE advertising in our world. Like talk about an absolute waste of your talent and contribution to the world.

Laying there on your deathbed someday and looking back on what you did in the time you were given…and it was making more ads, like how disgusted I feel about it all.

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[–] stolid_agnostic@lemmy.ml 11 points 2 years ago

The single worst decision they made was rolling back the 20% of work time being dedicated to side projects. That’s where all their good early ideas came from. It was replaced by politics instead.

[–] macattack@lemmy.world 167 points 2 years ago (1 children)

"Decisions went from being made for the benefit of users, to the benefit of Google, to the benefit of whoever was making the decision,"

That's a bar.

[–] UFODivebomb@programming.dev 45 points 2 years ago (1 children)

The googlers i know spend a lot more time than I'd expect on performance reviews. Not really on like... Doing shit. Just reviewing and selling what little is done to get that next pay bump.

[–] corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 15 points 2 years ago (1 children)

These recent months it seems the reviewing and selling, the hype-mongering, is more about remaining employed than it is a pay bump.

It's a sad state of affairs when the inexperienced code-olympiads you hire need to transition partially from devs-as-engineers to introverts-as-showmen. It's like they hired apples, made them work like oranges, and now only keep the ones who can also be dolphins.

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[–] ezchili@iusearchlinux.fyi 144 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (13 children)

Sundar Pichai has got to be the worst CEO in the silicon valley period

Google has managed to produce next to nothing of value with a dreamteam of engineers the likes of which no one else had access to

From one uninspired leadership decision to the next they've just been sitting there bolstering what's already there while every once in a while adding a new product to the Google graveyard

[–] rambaroo@lemmy.world 41 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (2 children)

Google is one of the most engineer driven companies out there. Their engineers are simply massively overrated. A ton of leetcoder kiddies got into FAANG companies over the years and a lot of them are just plain shit as professional developers.

Edit: also the way they evaluate engineers drives them to create half-baked products that get abandoned. It's incredible how they still haven't figured out that people want stable, maintained products, not "innovation" that doesn't actually help anyone and never turns into a finished product.

[–] SchizoDenji@lemm.ee 30 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Their hiring process is the reason why leetcoder kiddies get in there in the first place. 3 seperate coding rounds with questions not even related to the domain that you need to solve in a timer of 45 mins.

[–] rambaroo@lemmy.world 18 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Yep. And they also used to do the stupid brain teaser stuff back in the day. That's what happens when you hire out of touch PhDs to design your hiring process instead of people with real world experience.

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[–] EnderMB@lemmy.world 18 points 2 years ago (7 children)

As a counter-point, what new services or products have any of the FAANG companies released that the average person uses, over the last few years?

Big tech was built on a handful of runaway successes, and building on moonshot ideas, allowing engineers to work on "the next big thing" without fear of liability.

Now, if it doesn't work, you get laid off. At least if you worked for a startup, you'd get enough equity to make a ton of money if it works out...

Pichal is shit, but so are Zuck, Tim Cook, Andy Jassy, and the two at the helm at Netflix.

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Yup, he's the absolute worst. I can't think of a single product that Google has even improved during his tenure as CEO... let alone a product that he successfully launched on his own. All he can do is make existing products more expensive.

Look at how he completely lost his shit when chatgpt was released - probably a huge part of the reason he lost it is cause he realized he'd have to actually do something useful instead of just squeezing more blood from the collective stone of all Google's existing products. His claim to fame is creating Chrome. What fucking good is that? Web browsers have existed since the time he was born. There's nothing to innovate there, and there never has been. It's clear: he's not an innovator.

Whoever takes over after he's gone is going to be in for a hell of a time. The only thing he's created for Google is a shit-ton of anti-trust lawsuits. The company is an empty husk at this point. There's nothing left for them to become.

[–] dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.com 15 points 2 years ago (1 children)

From a shareholder's perspective, which is the only perspective C suite executives care about, he's been the best CEO of all time for Google.

[–] fsmacolyte@lemmy.world 14 points 2 years ago (3 children)

Sure, in the short term. I've switched to DDG and I'm not getting another Pixel when I need a new phone, and hoards of tech savvy people are feeling the same way. Dissatisfaction is causing them to lose customers and talent.

Eventually, they'll start feeling it in their bottom line. And by then it might be too late to change course.

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[–] cyborganism@lemmy.ca 121 points 2 years ago (4 children)

LoL no shit. You don't even need to be an employee to figure this out. Even as a customer I feel that way. I'm looking to leave Google altogether.

[–] silkroadtraveler@lemmy.today 54 points 2 years ago (3 children)

I went to modify my 2018 Google Wi-Fi router to add a simple port forwarding rule, and the functionality is completely GONE from their already shitty Google Home app. It used to be so easy and simple on the old Wi-Fi app. I’m never buying another Google device.

This company has reached enshittification nirvana.

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[–] bloopernova@programming.dev 26 points 2 years ago (4 children)

I've switched to Kagi for search, and Fastmail for email. Though a bit more difficult to escape Google when you've got a pixel 8 pro ;)

[–] badmemes@feddit.de 31 points 2 years ago (1 children)
[–] andrew@lemmy.stuart.fun 11 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

Whaaaat, it's supported now? It wasn't for a bit. (Or maybe I'm thinking of Lineage) Man, I may have to make the jump soon, or at least just test it out. It's been a while since I've played with a custom ROM though, since the pixels are a great vanilla experience.

[–] steal_your_face@lemmy.ml 9 points 2 years ago

It’s super easy to install graphene. They even have a web installer.

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[–] phoneymouse@lemmy.world 24 points 2 years ago (6 children)

I left Google 5-6 years ago. I do occasionally use YouTube, but that’s about it.

It’s surprisingly easy to get used to once you do it.

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[–] i_am_hungry@meganice.online 8 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I've switched to duck duck go and I'm working on leaving Gmail, but damn it's taking a while to update my email address everywhere, hoping after couple of months I won't have any Google products left in my name.

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[–] ipkpjersi@lemmy.ml 29 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Yep, layoffs tend to hurt culture and trust.

[–] Oneobi@lemmy.world 16 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Some companies seem to thrive on regular culls in the name of operational efficiencies. All that happens is talent leaves the organisation and then those left behind struggle because expertise has gone.

It erodes good will and good will is something you can't win back.

By the time things look like they are normalising, in comes another cull!

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[–] zeppo@lemmy.world 11 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Layoffs while at the same time handing the CEO $200 million for a single year.

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[–] jjjalljs@ttrpg.network 25 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Yeah Google kind of sucks now and everyone paying attention knows. They kill a lot of products and don't really make anything new and good.

Their search returns too many ads and SEO garbage sites.

They can't unify on messaging. Talk, hangouts, allo, duo, meet... Just pick one. But I guess that doesn't look as good on someone's resume.

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[–] KingThrillgore@lemmy.ml 20 points 2 years ago (4 children)

It's been a long time brewing with how Google manages projects and people, and Sundar is just the dipshit who's been helming it. Google needs a rethink, because once the ad market collapses (and it will collapse, they're helping it along with their crusade against YouTube) they will be rudderless and moneyless.

I really wish I was motivated to finish my transition off Google because right now, storage and email are the two things left to address. And without funding, I can't keep investing in NAS storage, or be bothered to move off Gmail for a new email vendor (which has its own problems with any non-Google email sinking into someone's XBL).

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[–] varsock@programming.dev 19 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

The letter is a post on his own blog . Hard to distill into a summary so I recommend reading it get more context. But it seems to have boiled down to:

  • How It Was:

    • Strong adherence to the "don't be evil" ethos, focusing on societal good over profits.
    • Open, transparent communication and decision-making processes.
    • High morale, with a culture of learning from successes and failures.
    • Work focused on benefitting the web and users, rather than Google's immediate interests.
    • Collaboration and lack of internal silos, encouraging innovation and autonomy.
  • How It Is Now:

    • Shift from user-centric to Google-centric, and then to individual-centric decision making.
    • Eroded transparency and increase in organizational silos.
    • Decline in morale and a culture of distrust between employees and management.
    • Focus on short-term financial gains leading to layoffs and defensive employee behavior.
    • Lack of clear vision and leadership, resulting in confused and ineffective management.
    • Overall deterioration of Google's unique, innovative culture and values.
[–] autotldr@lemmings.world 18 points 2 years ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:


An ex-Google employee has published a highly critical letter attacking the firm's "eroded" culture and accusing CEO Sundar Pichai of lacking "visionary leadership."

Posting on his blog, Hickson said he was "very lucky" to have experienced the early days of the company, where executives were candid with staff and ambitious experimentation was encouraged — but said the search giant's culture had since "deteriorated."

And he is far from the first employee who has criticized the company's increasing bureaucracy since founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin stepped away.

Since then it has been making smaller, quieter cuts across the company, to the point employees are now tracking layoffs in an internal document, Business Insider reported.

BI has previously reported tension between the rank-and-file and managers at Google over, for example, practices around labelling employees as low performers.

Hickson suggests there should be efforts to move power "from the CFO's office back to someone with a clear long-term vision for how to use Google's extensive resources to deliver value to users."


The original article contains 580 words, the summary contains 169 words. Saved 71%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

[–] flop_leash_973@lemmy.world 18 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

I’m sure the MBA’s will starting taking the opinions of the worker bees seriously any day now. /s

[–] antrosapien@lemmy.ml 14 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

No shit that moral too is all time low

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