Big Tech Killed the Golden Age of Programming

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lokar ◴[30 Jul 25 15:20 UTC] No.44735404[source]▶

I’ve seen this claim that Google and others had some plan to over hire.

From my time there that was not the case. There was the natural demand for more people on existing projects and lots of (often good) ideas for new projects.

The money just poured in. We could never actually hire close to the approved levels. Internal “fights” were over actual people, not headcount, everyone had tons of open headcount.

I think there was just so much money, revenue growth and margin that management (which was dominated by engineers) just did not care. Fund everything and see what happens, why not?

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1. blehn ◴[30 Jul 25 16:18 UTC] No.44736172[source]▶

>>44735404 #

Counterpoint: I worked there for years and the demand for more people wasn't natural. It came from (1) typical employees not getting much done because they were either not very motivated, not very competent, or stuck in meetings all day, (2) proliferation of people managers who weren't producing anything — product teams of 200 with 50 of them being managers, (3) managers playing the headcount game because it was a path to promotion — all things being equal, who's getting promoted: an L6 manager with 3 reports or an L6 manager with 12 reports? Constant headcount battles

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2. icedchai ◴[30 Jul 25 16:35 UTC] No.44736382[source]▶

>>44736172 (TP) #

This sort of corporate rot even infected smaller companies. Teams where we have a 1:1 PM to Engineer ratio, 3 person dev teams with a dedicated "engineering manager" that invents useless meetings to justify their position, individuals claiming they have no time for hands-on work due to all the meetings...

3. lokar ◴[30 Jul 25 17:05 UTC] No.44736734[source]▶

>>44736172 (TP) #

I’m talking about like 2003 to 2010 or 2015

4. skirmish ◴[30 Jul 25 17:56 UTC] No.44737421[source]▶

>>44736172 (TP) #

Also: telling a senior SWE (L5) that for good performance reviews they must act as a tech lead and spend most of their time in "alignment" meetings with other TLs and managers. Also: a team of 3 SWEs where each claims to be a tech lead of an area, purely for good performance reviews.

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5. ryandrake ◴[30 Jul 25 18:16 UTC] No.44737694[source]▶

>>44737421 #

> Also: a team of 3 SWEs where each claims to be a tech lead of an area, purely for good performance reviews.

This kind of forced role inflation is infuriating, and happens at every company I've worked for, big or small. You can't just get by on technical mastery anymore--you always have to be seen as a "leader" of some group or "leading" some project. Even if you just want to stand still in your career and get cost-of-living raises, there is this widely held expectation that you're always cosplaying as a leader of something.

6. Ferret7446 ◴[31 Jul 25 02:07 UTC] No.44741669[source]▶

>>44736172 (TP) #

Define "natural". IMO the demand absolutely was natural, you just don't agree with it (perhaps for perfectly good reasons)

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7. GreenWatermelon ◴[31 Jul 25 10:38 UTC] No.44744239[source]▶

>>44741669 #

I think "natural" here would refer to genuine project rrquirequirements that will translte directly to value to customers e.g. customers demand x features in y time and we don't have enough manpower to handle it. This is natural, it's business survival.

Contrast with the Unnatural cause of "manager just wants a promotion at any cost" which, in a sense, is akin to Embezzlement. The manager worsens business prospects and contributes to organizational rot for their personal gain.

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