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The Google Caste System
managedcode writes "Google doesn't like to do things traditionally. Right from their IPO, when they dumped Goldman Sachs for secretly trying to deal with their big investor, Kleiner Perkins. Business Week covers the Google Caste System, 'in which business types are second-class citizens to Google's valued code jockeys [..] They deem the corporate development team as underpowered in the company, with engineers and product managers tending to carry more clout than salesmen and dealmakers.' At last a company is shouting at the top of it's voice, engineers make the world."
Importance doesn't equal control in much respect. The executives and managers are still in control of the company's future, regardless of what the programmers, DB admins, and the like want to believe. Don't get me wrong, this is great for the company, and is theorhetically the best way to work it. If your workforce is happy, they are more productive and do better quality work. Quality work and productivity really make or break a company. Thus, if you motivate them and reward them to make them happy, the company will do well.
" At last a company is shouting at the top of it's voice, engineers make the world."
this reminds me of when steve balmer made his famous developers speech... "developers developers developers developers..."
will start to realise it's the employees that make their company work, not just the sales people!
http://www.gibby.net.au
Well, Google is still young. I'm fairly sure it will eventually enter middle age and the engineers will be replaced by marketing. Then when it gets old, the marketeers will be replaced by lawyers. It is just a question of time, years, or even decades.
Patents Drive Free Software as Hurricanes Drive Construction Industry
Google is still young. Eventually the business types, who have spent their lives studying how to manipulate people, will slowly take control from the folks who have spent their lives studying how to manipulate computers.
Engineering driven companies are nothing new, they're just normally not sustainable.
Semiconductor and Passives components manufacturing are normally:
a. small and founded by a geek with a good idea, who either...
1. sells out early OR
2. tries to make a go of it, spends too much time on pet projects and runs the company down.
b. large companies driven by suits who:
1. understand non-R&D business, ie. Sales and Operations, and remain competitive AND
2. acquire small companies run into the ground by geeks.
Why does Google do so well run by geeks? Dunno. It's astonishing they stay so focused. Guessing, maybe it's fear -- seems like they want to win so badly.
But right now every 'free' thing they do, from maps to mail, pumps the very serious ad business with eyeballs and press.
Think of a newspaper. The people who sell ad space and work in Classifieds are secondary to the reporters and editors who manage what stories go into the paper and the general political tone and direction. In fact, those sales people are generally looked down-upon as a necessary evil.
Think about TV. Who runs things, the people selling air time for commercials or the station manager who chooses what shows appear and what the format is when the network isn't forcing its agenda? Or even at network level, what directs them - people who sell ads or creative people who think their program could be a hit?
Radio is the same. Google's business model is: Sell non-obtrusive ads associated with information services. To do this, they need compelling services to make people get ads on the same web page. These services are like shows on TV or juicy news articles - they drive eyeballs, which allows for ad revenue.
Really, there is no other way to run it and make money.
...and she doesn't own a computer, let alone have the faintest idea of how to use one. Google is this millennium's Ford Motor Company. Ford started the assembly line and all the other automakers followed suit. Google values what they consider their most valuable assets and reward them well for their efforts.
Another example; I was explaining Picasa to someone who was looking for a way to easily email photos who wasn't the most computer savvy of all people. She was leery about trying a new piece of software until she found out it's a Google product. She was all for it after that. In a lot of people's minds, Google == Quality. I am not saying it's right, but perception rules the world.
As a programmer, obviously I think its cool that engineers & techies who work on the product are valued at the same level (or above) the corporate company structure. I just don't see how this is so different from what has been going on at other tech companies, for instance Microsoft, where people have always been able to choose between moving up the management ladder or move up the food chain as an Independant Contributor. A lot of the Distinguished Engineers and Technical Fellows at Microsoft and specifically in MSR (and I'm sure the same is true of a lot of other companies) are really just engineers with no direct reports, and they are clearly esteemed and thought of as highly as anyone in the company.
I agree its cool, I'm just not so sold that its a new idea that applies only to Google.
Well, he convinced me that it was a two way street. That there is no shortage of good ideas and products out there, and the ONLY reason some succeed over others is becuase people like him and Sales people make it happen. They sell products that they know aren't quite ready yet (vaporware) because the company needs the revenue. They sell products that they know are inferior to the competition because their Scientists and Engineers made a stupid mistake early on in the product development lifecycle that didn't get caught until too late and the company can't afford to start over.
Basically he convinced me (a seasoned Engineer) that we need them as much as they need us.
So, be careful in your thinking about this issue.
I am sure you are right, because I have seen it happen. Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) was founded in 1959 by a couple of engineers. When I became aware of the company in 1963 it still had an engineering culture: the engineers ran the show, and the sales people were secondary. Somewhere around 1968, they renamed the programmers "software engineers" to give them more prestige.
As the company matured the culture changed. Even though I worked for DEC from 1975 to 1992, I cannot point to a specific event that was the watershed. The first symptom that I noticed was that the KS10 was said to be developed in secret to prevent it from being cancelled. Even if that wasn't true, the fact that engineers believed it indicates that the engineers no longer felt that they were making the decisions.
I wonder if paying commissions to the sales people was a symptom or a cause.
I don't blame the demise of Digital entirely on the shift from an engineering focus to a sales focus. There were some bad decisions made by engineering in the last few years. But I can't help wondering if those decisions might have been corrected more quickly by a younger company.
Strangely, IBM appears to be a counter-example. They are by far the oldest computer company, but they seem to have achieved some sort of dynamic equilibrium, where they are able to change direction as technology and markets change quickly enough to survive. I am sure some of that has to do with their size, but as General Motors reminds us, size is no guarantee of survival. I suppose they have internal institutions that keep them nimble.
There are some good books on Digital Equipment Corporation. See The Ultimate Entrepreneur for the story of DEC at its height, and DEC is Dead Long, Live DEC for a look back after its death.
John Sauter (J_Sauter@Empire.Net)
Both extremes are short sighted.
Microsoft has ossified because engineers, creativity, and innovation don't carry enough clout.
On the side, Apple is a second rate power in the I.T. world. They could be dominating the I.T. world like Microsoft now does, if not for the poor business decision they made when they got started of pricing their computers above IBM's crappy PCs. Giving more clout to smart business men at that time could have changed things.
A successful tech company needs to both the businessmen and the engineers sufficently empowered.
It seems Google has learned its lessons from Microsoft. Lets see if they also learn Apple's. More importantly, lets see if they remember both lessons as they expand and get big.
I do and so should everyone else. If the company want you to work 50-60-70 or more hours a week, the company is mismanaged and it's time to get out!. I have never had a job that requires me to work more than 40 hours.
To quote an old movie, Auntie Mame from 1958: "Life's a banquet and most poor suckers are starving to death!" If you work 50-60-70 hours a week, you are starving to death! Do you really want to look back on your life and say "Geeez.... What happened? I was at work!" Not me, no thank you very much!
If you mod me down, I *will* introduce you to my sister!