Comments on: Google’s brain drain…

By: Life@Google at diversity.net.nz

Life@Google at diversity.net.nz — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 02:53:41 +0000

[...] my post about the Google brain drain, a friend sent me this slideshow of the Google Zurich [...]

By: Ben Kepes

Ben Kepes — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 06:52:59 +0000

Hey Ex Google employee – thanks for your comment – I’d be keen to have a chat with you about your experiences – drop me a line if you’re keen

By: Name (required)

Name (required) — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 04:09:48 +0000

smart ppl want to work on interesting things. google didnt have much attrition till recently, bcos the smart ppl were resting in vesting.
thier million dollars won over thier apetite to work on interesting things.
now they want to move to start thier own companies or work for another early stage startup to finally do some real work, instead of hanging out in the campus for food and play.
ofcourse the ppl who joined google in last couple of years are not that good to the early googlers.

-an employee who quit after 6months and happily in a startup with no free food , but no bullshit.

By: Falafulu Fisi

Falafulu Fisi — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 01:48:15 +0000

In one swoop Justin has consigned Google to the same pile as other mature businesses, successful yes, but exciting and passion driven no.

No, Google, Microsoft are still the main exciting companies to attract top notch researchers. In any technology company, be it software or other industries, there is only a few at the top level who are doing state-of-the-art work, while there are many who are being employed below that par, like a pyramid for instance. It is the lower level people that move from company A to B or from A to C, because the stuff they do is quite boring according to the comment :

but then you put them into this horribly dull and easy drone work on AdWords and AdSense and they’re all bored to tears and totally disappointed because they really really really thought they were going to do something meaningful

and that is quite correct. So, these bored workers could find some new excitement at Facebook, perhaps it is a new evironment or more attrative pay packet, etc. Those types would soon find that once the honeymoon in a new company such as Facebook is gone, they would be looking to move again. The reason is what they do, regardless of who they work for is boring and that is fact. If they’re into the cutting edge stuff, they wouldn’t be bored at all.