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Google and Yahoo Creating Brain Drain?
Searchbistro writes "Software-engineering talent is flocking to Google and Yahoo. Business Week explores the possibility that the big two search companies are creating a brain drain on the rest of the industry. Google snapped up about 230 engineers last quarter. Some stolen superstars are Louis Monier, director of eBay, advanced technology research, and Kai-Fu Lee, a top-flight researcher at Microsoft. Yahoo hired dozens of top engineers, including Larry Tesler, former vice-president at Amazon.com. 'While the Internet leaders snatch up top tech talent, that creates headaches elsewhere. Some startups, for instance, say the talent drain has made their own hiring more difficult.'"
There are more than, say 500 good engineers in the US (supposing Google and Yahoo hired 500 people). Sure, not many VPs of big dot-coms are easy to hire but would a startup be able to afford the salaries/perks they demand?
I don't think it's that much of an issue....
You can hire almost anyone and still create crap, just as Microsoft does.
Apple has good pull to get people, but even better management. There are tons of talented people - the whole superstar thing can be folly. It's about a culture that permits creativity and innovation.
When you've got people at Microsoft worrying about uttering the word podcast, you can see that they are losing their relevance by the moment. It has happened to many giant companies - as they phase from entrepreneurial and flexible - to arrogant and rigid.
The emigration of a large proportion of highly skilled and educated professionals...
The emigration of highly educated workers...
The migration of skilled workers out of a country...
depletion or loss of intellectual and technical personnel...
A "brain drain" is caused by the depleted organization. In all of these definitions the emphasis is on the loss of brains. Where they go and what they go on to do isn't specified. An oppresive communist regime could see its top intellectuals flee the country, and have those intellectuals go somewhere free and just live normal non-intellectual lives and it would be "brain drain". What's described in this story isn't so much about companies losing out on talent, "brain drain", rather it's about the companies gaining it, i.e. Google and Yahoo. Besides, brains aren't in limited supply. It's not like one's gain is another's loss. If anything this means that brains become more economically in demand.
If aspiration is a virtue, achievement cannot be a vice.
If Google and Yahoo are doing the leading-edge research, and these top brains want to do this kind of research, and these companies are paying them top-dollars to do it, what's the problem? The article does mention that research at other companies are restricted (MS doesn't want researchers doing stuff that might impact their OS/Office sales, HP is doing less R&D)
If Google and Yahoo can attract the nerds, and you can't, that's your problem, isn't it?
Je ne parle pas francais.
Retranslate this as:
"Some companies bitch about some other companies who are paying more than they want to pay their own employees, employees leave, and outsourcing to India doesn't work that well. MBAs have to double their prozac dose to cope."
Your hybrid is not saving the environment. Its purpose is to make you feel good about buying something.
More precisely, it's good news for the quality engineers that haven't made huge discoveries, or the engineers looking for their break.
Brain drain only truly occurs when there's a lack of brains flowing to the industry or region, not simply because of a 'cornering of the market' on brains.
I don't because of the rampant unemployment in the tech sector... I do because mediocrity *is* is rampant in tech.
-M
hiring is difficult? boo fucking hoo. give me a job. the last thing i want to hear is that companies are having trouble hiring people.
Fast-forward to 2014.
Google the offers most popular network features, the OS, and the applications.
Every time something new comes along Google ties its version of that into its vast array of other services, and people gravitate towards it by default.
How is this different then Microsoft bundling IE?
Consider that others had map systems before Google. In the future, will Google get criticized for abuse when conglomerating new services into it's site?
I ask this because the line between application and website is getting blurred, and it seems to me that popular opinion on slashdot is that a monopoly should not bundle applications. How will we reconcile this in the future?
As for start-ups, well, it seems just that tad unlikely that many start-ups could afford the former Vice President of Amazon.com. So it's hard for me to cry too hard.
The other important thing to consider is that most IT folk do their best work young and fresh out of college. They're not "old hands", they're "young minds". The real innovators are almost invariably people who haven't learned yet that what they're coding is impossible.
There ARE coders who know something is impossible, but code it anyway, but they are relatively rare. If a start-up wants the absolute best (and at rock-bottom prices), then it needs to go after the recently-graduated. Better yet, the start-up should find hot talent prior to University and sponsor them through it in exchange for part-time work during University and a contract at the end.
The reason youth is important is that old-hands tend to get stuck in a rut. They get used to doing things a particular way and loose the ability to step back and see what it is that is really going on. Look at any online resume of an experienced coder. Odds are, most such folk have a very few skills they have honed to perfection - with the consequence that they can do next to nothing with them.
Now, look at the people who are experienced but who are ALSO doing some damn good work. Odds are high that they'll have a much more diverse range of skills, are much less in some mould or other and likely have a more "Classical" background or education, where diversity rather than finesse was appreciated.
Also, America's work habits burn people out very quickly. No real vacation, no time to recharge, the ideal is to "produce" not learn and the Corporate Culture is king. It is doubtful America's high-tech industry can take much more of this kind of abuse. Something has to give.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
The premise of this article is silly given the tiny number of openings filled by Google & Yahoo relative to the pool of engineering talent worldwide. Many great engineers never apply to either company, and those that do are likely to be overlooked due to imperfect filtering. Perhaps this "brain drain" story originated with the rumblings of some disgruntled manager at Microsoft. We all know google has a hardon for softies. Nonetheless, this article is ill-informed tripe.
It's just the free market economy at work. If someone else thinks Google and Yahoo are hiring too many of the best and brightest, then someone else needs to offer better pay, benefits, or working conditions.
This article presupposes that there is a large gap between the elite engineers and the plebes. It seems to suggest that there are a handful of really great programmers, and the rest are a bunch of retards. In reality, there is a large population of very talented engineers who do not have the PhD's from the big schools, and who do not have the impressive pedigree that places like Google look for. These people are just as likely to come up with the Next Big Thing (tm) as the MIT PhD's are, but they're far less likely to be taken seriously by the likes of Google.
IBM and HP both recently laid off 14,000 workers each. There should be plenty of brains out there, available for work.
IBM and HP didn't fire their top engineers.
So, there's demand in the market for talented people. This is a good thing. I'm a talented people. Most people here are talented.
And CS enrollment is declining too. And interest rates are low.
This is better than a bubble. Companies in the black are in a bidding war for us and the competition 5 years out is evaporating. Interest rates are still at "OMG if we hike it we die" levels.
Good times man, Good times.
I survived the last bubble and I'd have to say that the waters are chummed. Prepare yourselves for some forced coding marches and invest the spoils for the long haul.
"Let him go, Ralph. He knows what he's doing." --Otto Mann (simpsons)
The IT field is full of idiots and charlatans. The days of the dot bombs are gone - just having a CS degree, or worse, a MIS or similar stupid psuedo-CS degree, is not enough to cut it.
Now days, companies are looking for competent people. That means you will often have to prove that you are what you say you are.
The hordes of people, on Slashdot even, who sit here and balk at having to take relatively simple CS proficency tests and claim that there are no jobs for CS at all are the ones who got their CS degrees without really learning anything or having any actual proficency in the first place. On the other hand, the real geeks are getting jobs left and right and companies want more people like them - they can't find enough! The only people who need to worry about outsourcing are those who don't make the cut.
This is the market at work. It is a great time as ever to go into CS. Its just that this time, you will not be able to slack off and make it. You're going to have to prove yourself.
Lord High Crapflooder The Right Honourable Vlad Craig Esther McDavenpherson III
Destroyer of Mercatur.Net
Is there really a lack of talent out there, or are companies just lazy to make an effort to find them? Or take a risk on someone green? From the article it seems like startups are just looking at who's heading existing companies in hopes of luring them away.
In addition to high-paying salaries and perks, Google/Yahoo/M$ also provide a better work environment. Since a startup can't beat these big shots with money, all it can do is to search hard for guys with enough motivation to join a startup and make his own mark.
Anyone who does't want his own talent product marked with "Google®" or "Microsoft®" should go for a start-up. That's all anyone can do about this brain-drain.
In India, M$ is paying a fresh graduate around Rs. 7,50,000 which is way higher than the average of Rs. 2,80,000. Not to say anything about extremely flexible work hours, relaxed/no dress-code etc etc. Now, which one would you chose? A start-up with no guarentee to see light in next decade or a high-paying software giant?
IBM and HP both recently laid off 14,000 workers each. There should be plenty of brains out there, available for work.
Considering the huge number of layoffs over the last five years, that was my thought, too. There is no shortage of software engineers, and there hasn't been one for well over a decade.
What there is a shortage of is American developers willing to work for the same wages as receptionists. Every time large companies start bitching about a shortage of tech workers, it's a lead-up to increasing the H1B quota.
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
Most times, those who create a startup are under delusions as to how talented they are.
No comment.
Some startups, for instance, say the talent drain has made their own hiring more difficult.
boo fucking hoo. If there's only 250 competant engineers in the US looking for work then there's a much bigger problem than a 'brain drain' between companies.
There was a time when companies actually trained people out of college. Actually, now that I think about it, there was a time when companies actually hired people out of college.
New engineering logo of america:
Build us a bomb, or live with your mom.
The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky
Well, there is a big gap between the top performers and the average. From the impression I had of Google, there not looking for an Ivy League degree, just raw smarts.
The best engineering schools are MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, and Caltech. None of them is Ivy League.
So obviously Google aren't that interested in Ivy League degrees, as they're class "B".
They do run a risk of having a lot of PhD's who want to be top dog but are surrounded by other good PhD's with similar goals. This may not be a problem now, but when their stock bubble bursts and layoffs begin, it will be interesting to watch.
Why is there an "insightful" mod and why isn't it "-1"? If I wanted insight, I wouldn't be reading
With thousands of qualified and professional software engineers floating around the industry, the only issue may be finding an engineer who has established themselves with the industry with recognition to boot. There is no short supply, that's nonsense. If your startup has difficulty hiring because of this popularity drain, then it's time to look in greener pastures.
For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.
Unfortunately, speaking from experience, when companies layoff people on the magnitude of IBM or HP, they do it by project/product. I was laid off from a position about 4 years ago and our whole division was canned. Alot of very very smart people were let go and it amazed me that the company showed no interest in keeping the top talent.
"Thanks to the remote control I have the attention span of a gerbil."
I disagree.
I might give you "reduces the risk," but have to wholeheartedly disagree on "eliminates the risk."
Just like any engineering school, MIT has its "average engineers."
MIT has prestige, yes, but having visited there (and once toyed with the idea of going there) and having partnered with people from MIT on research projects, I can say that my impressions were that yes, they have some very hot shot people, and part of their strength is the availability of funding to buy research equipment; however, just like any school, they have their average engineers. They do have some awesome research projects which make for impressive resumes, but the lack of presence of these on the resumes of other students results from the fact that many other schools simply do not have the same funding. All this affords the MIT students is greater exposure (albeit usually less than a year) to very specific research projects, things that most engineers with the fundamentals (which are taught everywhere, and is up to the student to understand and retain) can pick up on a job in no time at all. Sometimes, but not always, this even affords the "outsider" an advantage because they often have to work under budget constraints (a real world problem) and engineer their solutions, as opposed to buy them. In the case of software, you don't deal with the same concerns as an engineer in optics whose average piece of equipment runs $100k USD, so a lot of people outside the MIT world have the same programming and development fundamentals as someone on the "inside," or at least close to the same.
Consider the recruiting side of this. MIT doesn't magically draw in super people. Both good and bad people, as well as good people who look bad and bad people who look impressive, want to get into MIT. All MIT has to go on is high school performance before they pull people in for their undergraduate program. Well, who here had an impressive high school transcript? *raises hand*
Did MIT send me an application packet? Absolutely.
Did I fill it out? No.
Did people who skimmed through high school because they could memorize things and make As on everything apply and get accepted? You bet.
One thing that people need to understand is that As in high school (and I am not some bitter individual trying to feel better by putting down A students--I was an A student who took almost every AP course I could) often mean that the student was good at memorizing the material (which is king in most--but not all--high schools). Well, that is unrelated to engineering. If a person wants to memorize their way through engineering, then they are simply being trained to be glorified technicians. Engineers are paid to think, not regurgitate information that one can easily look up in Google (har!)
You do have your MIT students who coast through school and put in the minimum amount necessary, some of them even banking on the prestige of their school to get them through. Well, you will notice that the tides of industry are changing; people are becoming wise to this, having hoped to "eliminate the risk" before only to be burned or more impressed with someone from a podunk school. They realize that MIT hires professors who often...didn't graduate from MIT. Other schools hire professors from the same schools as do MIT. There is no magic here. Yes, good professors often navigate toward these larger schools because the pay is better, but MIT is not so huge that they can hire them all. You find equally qualified engineering professors ending up in smaller schools (which actually afford the students more one-on-one time), and you often find these professors actually teaching the courses, as opposed to a student teaching assistant. Ask some MIT students, and I will guarantee you that not all of them will sing the praises of their professors, and in some cases they will tell you that they learned on their own because the class was taken over by some grad student so their professor could go toy around in the la
You know, a really good low-level manager really *is* worth the amount of money he's paid, if not more -- the problem is that many low-level managers are *not* really good and are paid as if they are.
* If you can enthuse your team as to what they're doing, that's a point. Enthusiastic people produce much better output than uninterested people. That's different from just enjoying the job -- having a jacuzzi in the office may make the job more enjoyable, but it doesn't necessarily make people enthusiastic about what they're doing.
* If you can pick up on what people's various triggers are, and adapt to them, that's a point. Some people like being presented with competitive environments, some people feel overwhelmed by them. Some people hate being told what to do -- it may be better to "guide" these people, ask them the same problems that you're trying to solve and let them come to the same conclusions you've reached, and other people feel more comfortable if they have clear instruction. Some people don't get work done without a clear schedule, and other people can't stand not having flexibility. Some people work best in serial -- one task at a time -- other people prefer being able to switch around between tasks. A good manager is going to be able to treat different employees differently, each as a different tool he can use to solve a problem, rather than try to force everyone to follow a particular mold.
High-level execs get a lot of flack on Slashdot. I haven't had to interact with these folks much, so I'm not really informed enough to make too much of a judgement. But consider, for a moment, what their role is (and ask yourself whether there is skill involved in it).
When an engineer is working on a problem, he usually gets to work on something that he's had the ability to specialize fairly much around. If someone, say, a vendor, starts feeding him technical bullshit, it's easier for him to figure out that something is up, because he's got a good deal of knowledge in the field. He has to know his field *intimately*, and there is generally little room for error -- if you're wrong about something from a technical standpoint, you are *wrong*. On the other hand, he does have some advantages. The things he's working with are fairly straightforward -- complex, perhaps, but they do something, are intended to do something, and if they aren't, something is wrong. It might be material used in a bridge or chips in a product, but this pretty much holds. He generally has tools that can let him get accurate information about any problems -- it may consume time to do so, or even be somewhat difficult, but if he wants to he can probably diagnose problems to a high degree of accuracy.
An exec has to run organizations that deal with things that he does not have the luxury of specializing in. He *knows* that he doesn't know the details of what he's working with, so he's essentially blind-fighting a bit. A vendor *can* sell him a line of bullshit on technical matters, because he hasn't had the time to specialize in a field. The things he's working with are usually groups of people that have all sorts of agendas, and frequently are not giving him accurate information -- how much funding they *really* could get by with, whether they really believe that they can still finish their project, people who are busy passing the buck and so forth. If he wants to have an engineer review a vendor's claims, he doesn't know whether or not the engineer may be claiming more knowledge than he really has, or may have bias, or whatnot. So he lacks the precision diagnostic tools of the engineer, and has no hard guarantee of being able to obtain accurate information. The upside of being an exec is that mistakes may lead to softer failures than technical mistakes -- you can do something "sort of right" and still have it work quite well, and not have anyone really be able to easily call you out on it. Someone who's really good at handling these tools and working within this kind of system *can* be really v
Any program relying on (nontrivial) preemptive multithreading will be buggy.
I've spent the last few days doing some very important searching - we're thinking about launching a new product in a rather arcane field, and I want to be absolutely certain who the potential competition might be - hence I decided to search both Google & Yahoo!.
Guess what? Yahoo! search beats Google search, hands down. Not even close.
Two thoughts:
It kind of seems to me like they mentioned Yahoo for a lark in this article.
Actually, I'd bet you dollars to donuts that this article was "seeded" by a PR firm in the employ of Yahoo. Their goal: create the impression that Yahoo is second only to Google as a search engine and an employer of Smart People. Make Yahoo seem cool like Google is. For example, the sentence "Yahoo also carries substantial geek cred."
Paul Graham unveils this concept in great detail in his essay The Submarine.
Notice the number of quotes from Yahoo employees vs. the number from Google employees, the insider information about Yahoo's future plans vs. the use of facts you already knew about Google anyway.
Bet.
Graham "Teach" Mitchell, computer science teacher, Leander HS
Nice stuff. The initial pictures don't show off the marquetry enough, though. Using solid hardwoods everywhere like that, you can't be making a big profit. If I weren't so broke, I'd offer to swap my HP 3562A for some of your gear.
On the DSP side, I've always wanted an automatic equalizer that would take a mic input, compare it with the test signal the equalizer is feeding into the stereo and automatically correct the frequency response. There are that do this, but the design seems like overkill, using lots of powerful DSPs to implement 74 hybrid IIR/FIR filters. Is there any reason not to do a FFT and multiply the frequency components by the correponding part of the desired response curve? Does this have some uncorrectable bad effect? Latency could be an issue for live music, but should be OK for a stereo. Seems to me like it should work, and give much finer frequency control.
"Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery?" - Patrick Henry
Firstly, computer programming is not engineering.
...you're not going to get VCs shoving money up your arse just because you can install Linux.
Engineering is applied physics. Development is applied mathematics. So, you are correct. Developers are incorrect to call themselves engineers.
Secondly, there is a difference between software development and computer programming, which I think you are attempting to blur.
Secondly, why would a programmer have a right to work for more than a receptionist. Receptionists have a much worse job, it's only fair and democratic that those with more stimulating jobs get them in exchange for a lower wage.
Wages are based on two things. One, the amount of money your work creates. And two, the difficulty to replace you, ie your skill rarity.
One could ask why Michael Jordan made so much money. Obviously, anyone can play basketball, which after all, is only a game. The fact is that he could have arguably been called the best player in the world. So one, people paid a lot of money to see not just his team, but him on a regular basis. And two, since he was the best player in the world, he was irreplaceable.
Both software developers and programmers require special skills that take years of training and experience to acquire before even being qualified for an entry level position. That alone makes them rare, with the actual good ones being more rare. Not only are developers rare, but companies have built fortunes off of their work. So, one and two from above are easily covered.
A receptionist does not make a lot of money for the company. And a receptionist can be replaced by almost anyone walking off the street. Since they can not cover one and two above, they are paid poorly.
Now you are confusing administrators with programmers and developers.