Google reviews in Mountain View CA

Over the years, I have enjoyed working with the brightest and best of those in the bay area. The company continues to amaze me with the growing number of cutting edge technology and services. Pay is competitive and benefits are great. I love the food. Thanks chefs for all the good cooking you do. Self starters will benefit most here.

Although you are not required to put in more than 40 hours a week, it does become a norm to stay and work late. Depending on the department you're in, I've seen a lot of people come and go. There are a lot of consultants and they change so often that it is hard to really get to know anyone. Our meticulous hiring process can discourage interested people and sometimes we do lose out on the best talent.

You've probably already how great it is - most of it's true. The perks are awesome, the people are smart, the pay is solid - what more can you ask for...

Definitely starting to lose it's mojo - doesn't quite have the same energy that it used to when I started, probably b/c some of the best people are bailing

Google is an awesome workplace for young, agile engineers willing to push their technical boundaries. All employees are given a fair amount of freedom, 10% of free time. You will also get lots of on-the-job training combined with tuition reimbursement program. There's free food, free laundry, and even a gym.

The workplace atmosphere is stressful, and adolescent-like company culture isn't for everyone. If you are an engineering manager, you will find recruiting new Googlers quiet frustrating; Remember, you are looking for the top 1% talent. In addition, your job advancement can be arbitrary, and to a large degree it depends on if one can develop a personal working relationship with upper-management.

- Tech talks, guest speakers, brown bags, etc. provide vast opportunities to explore infinite number of subjects. - Working on some of the most interesting and innovative projects in the world. - Excellent senior management.

- Long workdays: about 11 hours/day is the norm for many engineers. - Engineering managers are good, but there is plenty of bad ones. Some managers I've worked with are outstanding, others not so good. Haven't had any managers that I thought were actively out to get me.

ESP at $308 as of 2009 Q1; High propensity of getting a bonus: approx $8000 per year; 401k match; Free food; Friday TGIF with beer and wine; Smart staff; All of this will make you feel like a "hundred bucks" but... [read more below]

Office - imagine an open space with 10 people sitting next to each other and working, taking calls and other. Some senior engineers are having hard time to focus while surrounded by jumpy, loud talkers who have problems to stay put for 30 minutes at the time. Project management - incoherent management of projects, lack of discipline and launch schedule. It's very hard to estimate what and by when project will be launched. There is no one to enforce some discipline on code quality and stability. Launch delay quarter after quarter. When accountability finally comes and the project risks of being canceled, I see desperate launch push and poor code quality. Projects/Work - Google is primarily an advertisement (instead of technology) company. The web search infrastructure is awesome however only need a relatively small number of people work on that. The available projects for most people, especially in satellite offices, are limited and not technically hard-core. If you are a senior and talented engineer, you may not find a local project that allows you to focus and solve hard challenging technical problems. It also becomes harder to find other senior talented engineers that you respect and love to work on, given senior engineers are leaving and junior engineers are joining. Managers - Mid to senior level managers are dissassociated from ongoing tasks or projects. Managers are unaware what each software engineer is doing. Don't expect much recognition. Majority managers are not technically strong and write zero or negligible code. Don't expect technical guidance or leadership You will neither see much career mentoring nor other technical couching. I had 1:1 with my previous manager maybe 3~4 times during the whole year period. Despite being the project manager, all his involvement was to attend a few meetings - just to claim "grand" contributions during all hands staff meetings. Career growth - Despite the peer review model, the manager's feedback appear to be what really matters. Engineers who suck up to their managers are more likely to be promoted. If you are hard-working engineer that is able to and like to solve hard problems independently without making superficial noises, and expect Google to recognize your contributions, you will be very disappointed. I know some of such solid and senior engineers; about half of them already left Google. This is very counter-intuitive given the perception people have about Google. Engineering quality - I am disappointed with the code quality of my current team. Despite Google's code review standard and practices, too many times people hastily touch existing code or add hacky code with no real testing. Such code checked in and deployed to data center. Overall it requires a lot more unnecessary iterations and bug fixes to stabilize the system. I don't mind working 60 hours per week at all but it is frustrated to see most time wasted dealing with silly buggy integrated system. There is no engineering process to ensure code quality and stability or make a launch date more predictable. I see a general lack of engineering discipline and experience to implement very solid code from software engineers with no or just a few years experience.

As a Google engineer you will work on problems can be incredibly rewarding. The engineering staff is very bright and the learning curve is very, very steep - and never ceases to be anything less. The perks are being reduced, but remain competitive more than those of Yahoo or Adobe. Trust me. Middle managers don't micromanage, so you get to work mostly on your own. This may be a negative or positive, depending on your attitude to work.

Reduction in employee benefits are labeled as "being more green" or "adhering to the City of Mountain View laws". Google's founders, Sergey and Larry are engaged in just about every major launch decision and project - sometimes leading to unexplainable outcomes. Red tape, but again, which Corporate America company does not have one?

Working with super talented, and very driven engineers is a huge plus. Google offers awesome food services, including 3 three meals per day, and 2 on off-campus offices, ESP (up to 15% of your salary), 401k matching (+ 2% free), subsidized gym membership, as well as tuition assistance (up to 10k a year).

Changing between projects is close to impossible due to many HR rules, and in the end few people manage to switch. In off-main campus offices the selection of projects is limited, and you will be discouraged from finding cool projects on the main campus. Secondly, becoming friends with your manager is a proven way for getting bonuses or quick job promotion, rather than displaying a high level of technical competence. Actually, your competence or initiative can make your manager feel insecure, and can hurt your chances for a good performance review in the long run. Finally, Google claims that it uses 360-degree performance review, but in reality feedback from peers is not given weight as the manager's one.

As a Product Manager I've never met so many top notch people at one company - ever. I have worked for 12 years in industry now, and I feel challenged to the max every day. Best of all Google's perks are one of the best. Healthy + bad food ;) dry cleaning, education/ training money, wine on campus, movies, social networking, team building trips - just to name the few.

The work environment is stressful, and the culture is somewhat of adolescent: fast, fun and don't learn from your mistakes. Career advancement is very hard as it is based on a personal bond with your manager and can be arbitrary.