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Microsoft's Treatment of Google Defectors
Miguel de Icaza (Note, this Miguel is not the Ximian developer, just someone whose small life is fulfilled by trolling under someone else's name) writes "Here is a story revealing just how threatened Microsoft is by Google. While senior partners can expect the full chair experience, some lowly staffers who are putting in their notice are being escorted off campus immediately. Why? Because they've put in their notice to join Google. In Microsoft's eyes, Google is Enemy No. 1. Anyone leaving Redmond for the search leader is a threat. Not because they'll scurry around collecting company secrets — as if Google's interested in Microsoft's '90s-era technologies. Departing employees, however, might tell other 'Softies how much better Google is. If an employee is leaving for Amazon.com or another second-tier employer which doesn't make Microsoft so paranoid, they'll probably serve out the traditional two weeks of unproductive wrapping up. So if you're planning on leaving Microsoft for Google, pack up your belongings and say goodbye to friends ahead of time. There'll be no cake and two weeks of paid slacking for you."
If you're leaving these days it's not uncommon to get escorted to the door... and it's not uncommon to be a perp walk, which sucks. It undermines the fabric of trust in the workforce generally and damages individual psyche specifically. Microsoft isn't unique in this regard, though the article does seem to indicate it is Google-specific.
If it is Google-specific it underscores Microsoft's pettiness, and maybe a little stupidity. They should enforce a consistent policy. Unless an employee has shown himself to be a bad seed, treat him (or her) with respect.
I experienced the perp walk (layoff) after 21 years with qwest. It has garnered nothing but ill will since. The net balance of this kind of treatment is surely negative. You can handle this kind of policy with dignity. Most don't.
While I doubt too many Google employees are leaving for the crumbling Monarchy that is Microsoft, I wouldn't be surprised if Google has similar policies and procedures.
While that is the right thing to do, why on earth would you tell your current employer where you are going next?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I've been twiddling with computers for a long time now. For me, Microsoft has always been like Churchill's definition of democracy -- it's the worst operation system (for the general public) except for all the others that have been tried. Yeah, macheads could argue that the OS* flavors are great but so many people would never even bother taking a look due to the premium price paid for the hardware. And Linux on the desktop? That was as far off as fusion power plants. Nothing Microsoft did was particularly elegant but you just sucked it up and dealt with it. What other choice did you have?
Well, it seems like Microsoft has really gotten itself in a bind. I think it's certainly possible for them to reverse course and right things for the company but I don't think it's plausible. Not that they're going to evaporate tomorrow, just that they've peaked and are entering a shallow and prolonged decline. Why is this? Because the very kind of corporate culture change that would allow Microsoft to get lean and agile is an affront to the power structure. I love Orwell's quote on this sort of thing: "The point is that we are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right. Intellectually, it is possible to carry on this process for an indefinite time: the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield." In this case, substitute "marketplace" for "battlefield."
The poster above nailed it when they said that Microsoft's products aren't exciting and thus the company itself is not an exciting place to work for. Why is it that Microsoft has to buy innovative companies instead of spinning off ideas from internal skunkworks? Because the corporate culture smothers innovation in the cradle.
So now we're seeing a mixture of interesting trends. Ubuntu has really made desktop Linux practical for the average Joe, I'd say 90% of the way there. That last 10% is up to the 3rd parties, bundling drivers so that a non-tech can go to the store, buy a widget, take it home and have it work right out of the box. We've got ridiculously low-priced laptops, both the OLPC and that new one from Asus. We've also got more encroachment from smart phones, PDA's, etc. These are all devices that are taking over activities that used to be wedded to PC's, big, bulky desktop machines running Windows. We've got open source office applications that can run native under Windows or Linux. They will only improve in time. Google is spitting out innovations left and right.
While making future predictions in the computer arena is a fairly silly thing to do, I'll go out on a limb and say that Microsoft is in serious trouble here. In order to overcome these dangers, the Microsoft kakosarchy will have to go away. Otherwise I think we're looking at a long, slow withering.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
I don't want to cite references, so just take this as anecdotal, but judging from comments from people who've left Google, and some other Silicon Valley commentators, I've recently been getting the impression that working at Google isn't really that great (at least, no better than MS). Supposedly there are too many people for too few profitable projects (remember where 95%+ of Google's revenue comes from) and thousands of people are, allegedly, working on projects that are going nowhere. I've also heard that since the IPO, a two-tier kind of environment has built up between the rich, old employees and the new ones.
I read somewhere that Microsoft developers write something like 1,000 lines of code a year
/. or somewhere else but I recall reading a story of a person hired at MS whose job was to revamp the shutdown/suspend/sleep features of Vista, mainly involving the menu options available to the user. After 6 months or so he left in disgust because of all the bureaucracy involved. He attended dozens of meetings, had something like 6 different groups providing input on requirements, menu design, etc. (but nobody actually responsible for resolving issues/conflicts) In his time there he ended up only writing a few hundred lines of code, and attended just about as many meetings.
I forget if it was here on
I would love to find that article again. It was very interesting reading.
Unfortunately this is not always true. I worked in a computing lab at the University of Tennessee in the 90's. We had a girl who came in to do backups every evening. She put in her notice one day, served it out, still making the backups. After she left, she logged in with the still-unchanged root password and trashed our systems. And it turned out the last few "backups" she made were blank. I guess she was pissed about something; we never firgured out what.
I'd like to add to this. I worked there for 5 years and left a burned-out husk ;) but the company did offer huge variety. Think about it - where else would you be able to work on databases, consumer internet apps, graphics device drivers, compilers, console games, etc. All in the same company. Any area you are interested in, Microsoft has a group doing it. Plus they have a fair amount of financial stability, which does count when you have dependents.
Anyway, I'm no Microsoft apologist but if you want to work on technology, they can offer that. As for endless meetings without getting much done. Here's some news - LOTS of places are like that. My first job at a government contractor, I think I wrote one PERL script of about 20 lines in a year. There are pros and cons, you career shouldn't just be a "Microsoft sucks" knee-jerk reaction.