Google Reviews in Mountain View, CA

Pros

For lack of a better way to say it, Google is just a fun place to work. There are a lot of different personalities and the attitude of the whole place is very relaxed. The best thing, however, is that this doesn't detract from the drive that individual employees and the company's leadership have to create great products and really make life better for millions (or billions) of people. It's refreshing to go to work every day with people who are very smart but still pretty down-to-earth. Another key benefit is the fact that the company is very open in terms of sharing information with its employees. Top-secret projects are regularly shared company-wide and help employees feel that they're really engaged with the company's mission and accomplishments. Finally, for product managers specifically, the scope of the job at Google is much broader than what you might get with a similar level of experience at other large tech companies, which makes you feel like you're making much more of an impact.

Cons

Despite Google's efforts to maintain a startup-like atmosphere, it's still true that big-company hurdles -- like legal issues, regulatory concerns, and just standard VP approval processes for big decisions -- can slow down the process of doing cool things. And although the average talent level is quite high, the discipline and effectiveness of individual engineers can still vary somewhat significantly, so sometimes you'll have to deal with people who just don't work as quickly or independently as you'd like. Finally, in an engineering-centric company like Google, a PM can occasionally feel a little like the "e-mailer in chief," a person who nags other people a lot but doesn't get to do "real" work and who doesn't get the same respect as an engineer.

Pros

Fun culture and people are incredibly smart and passionate about work/life
Lots of free food (be careful or you'll gain the Google 15)
Flexible schedule (I was able to work from home when I needed to)
 Any time I called or emailed a passive candidate I almost always got a response.

Cons

If you get in as a contractor at the wrong time it's impossible to get hire to FTE
Not any training, still acts like a start up
Too many recruiters--we were sometimes stepping on each other with candidates

Advice to Senior Management

Career paths for recruiters

Pros

More than any other workplace, Google trusts its employees. Each engineer has access to almost the entire codebase and there is very little micromanaging.

Cons

It's hard to get promoted. Performance is decided mostly by your peers, which means promotion is essentially a popularity contest.

Advice to Senior Management

Most managers at google have 20+ direct reports and are extremely busy, but the ones who take the time to speak to their reports about what they need to do differently to advance their career are the stars.

Pros

The people, food, events, culture, and scale of work were all incredible. How many places provide cooking internships for employees?

Cons

Middle management was a bit slow. Things are getting more bureaucratic; it can be very hard to get things done.

Advice to Senior Management

Be more transparent with your contract workers. Review some of the internal policies you have about promotion. Do more 360 reviews of managers.

Pros

The best working environment I have ever seen. Everyone is generally a team player; everyone is very smart. The leadership will make big bets to try to make things better for the user; the internal transparency is rare and everyone shares information quite freely. The benefits are industry leading and the relative youth of the company keeps it a remarkably fun place to work.

Cons

There really isn't much that could be described as a Con. There are some growing pains as the company decides the right balance between more process and maintaining creativity and a slight sense of chaos in the various groups.

Advice to Senior Management

Continue to reward merit. Actively and visibly manage out poor performers and those who don't exhibit the cultural values we cherish so much.

Pros

- Sets the bar for employee perks
- Work with some of the best in the industry
- Develop content on projects used globally

Cons

- Sometimes a bit too relaxed
- Lots of internally developed tools that can only be learned on the job

Advice to Senior Management

Can feel a bit fragmented internally among the various teams, and it is challenging at first to understand the various groups, their roles, and how to get certain tasks done.

Pros

Working with smart people daily, amazing gourmet free food, fantastic career growth opportunities within Google. If you don't like the project you're working on, you can transfer to a different project, even to be a different "type" of engineer (e.g. frontend/backend/storage). I work with people who've worked on several projects at Google.

Working on projects that you genuinely believe help make the world a better place, helping users connect with each other or give them greater access to information.

I like the direction Larry has taken the company, feels more focused now than before.

Very pro-women, pro-LGBT, pro-minority environment. I'm a female software engineer and have not seen a shred of the sexism or attitude towards women that I've experienced at other workplaces.

Cons

While not totally necessary, being on a higher profile project helps with recognition and career advancement. I work on one such project and have since I've been at Google, so I can't really say what it's like if you work on other projects.

Having a good manager (as I do) is definitely important to being promoted and getting put on projects where you can earn recognition. Not all managers are as awesome as mine and their reports suffer for it in terms of career growth and interesting tasks to work on.

Advice to Senior Management

Better training for engineering managers. A good manager is crucial to career growth at Google, and not all engineers make good managers.

Pros

Started and worked on amazing products, which turned out to be highly successful.

Cons

It became way too political, specially with upper management completely lost its way and lacking a vision.

Advice to Senior Management

Listen to people who are good at their jobs and delivering results rather than random 'group' managers and directors.

Pros

Perks are second to none. Google provides every employee with free food freshly prepared on site each day by professional chefs. Google also provides free transportation to / from work from many areas where employees live. Google also has health care facilities on-site so that employees don't have to spend time driving to the doctor. Google employees can also pay to have their hair cut, get their oil changed, get their dry cleaning done, even get their bicycle repaired all on-site.

Cons

To thrive at Google as a software engineer, at least a Masters degree in computer science or equivalent course of study is needed. A Google employee without a masters degree or Phd will not see the same opportunities for advancement or career development. Some of the technologies used at Google are proprietary, so skills developed in those technologies are not relevant at other tech companies.

Pros

It is the best place for software engineers. You can lean a lot from smart googlers. Also, meals are free.

Cons

MTV is in California, which means higher tax rate, higher living cost, etc. However, you may make more money in google than other companies.

Advice to Senior Management

In general, they are doing really good. I cannot think of anything bad about them. I like the way Larry Page is leading Google.