Snapchat Sneakily Uses Its Own App to Poach Uber Engineers(forbes.com)
forbes.com
Snapchat Sneakily Uses Its Own App to Poach Uber Engineers
http://www.forbes.com/sites/kathleenchaykowski/2015/04/15/snapchat-sneakily-uses-its-own-app-to-poach-uber-engineers/
18 comments
Poaching is a commonly used term to describe this. It's been used for a long time.
You know? You're absolutely right. And words are important.
Oxford English dictionary lists the following definition of "poach": "take or acquire in an unfair or clandestine way". seems reasonable to me, the connotations are your own.
Company A takes or acquires Company B's talent. it's not about Company B owning the person, it's about Company B possessing an employee, the abstract.
Company A takes or acquires Company B's talent. it's not about Company B owning the person, it's about Company B possessing an employee, the abstract.
Both 'take' and 'acquire' imply possession.
RyanDrake is making the point that companies do not possess or own their employees. To use language implying they do is insulting and demeaning.
RyanDrake is making the point that companies do not possess or own their employees. To use language implying they do is insulting and demeaning.
sorry, i already edited my response to address just this (so to readers your response might not seem as relevant as it was).
the technicalities of your argument imply that it is false for any company to say "we have X employees" and it is offensive for them to say "we have the best talent in the valley". the only truth would be "our company has no employees".
if you feel that way, at least you're logically consistent. it just feels disingenuous to me.
the technicalities of your argument imply that it is false for any company to say "we have X employees" and it is offensive for them to say "we have the best talent in the valley". the only truth would be "our company has no employees".
if you feel that way, at least you're logically consistent. it just feels disingenuous to me.
From the sources I'm seeing, poaching is generally defined as "illegal hunting". One of the major points of the top level comment is that using the word poaching carries the connotation of illegality. I agree, and I think it primes the reader for what to expect from the article before they've read it (or in the cases where someone only sees the headline, sets their expectations unless corrected).
"It’s extremely hard for these companies to find good engineering talent"
As someone who's trying to get his first junior position: is it really that hard or do they mean experienced engineers? Are companies generally not interested in hiring and training juniors?
As someone who's trying to get his first junior position: is it really that hard or do they mean experienced engineers? Are companies generally not interested in hiring and training juniors?
When you're competing for the cream of the crop, yes it's hard.
As in my other comment, they mean proven talent. It's very hard to assess engineers so the easiest way is to let some other company do it and then poach them.
Training in this industry is basically a lie told to children. It doesn't exist at startups and barely exists at corporates.
Training in this industry is basically a lie told to children. It doesn't exist at startups and barely exists at corporates.
>Training in this industry is basically a lie told to children. It doesn't exist at startups and barely exists at corporates.
Should it really though? As developers/testers/whatever position we occupy in the tech space, most of us are pretty good at picking up new languages/technologies/frameworks/tools etc. in a pretty short amount of time.
Personally I think having well working teams with not only people of solid experience at the helm, but who have good communication skills and enjoy sharing knowledge, is far better in terms of developing juniors / new developers than simply sticking them on a few formalized training courses every year. Throw in collaborative 10%/20%/etc. time and you've a recipe for good development teams, in my opinion.
Now, when you're talking about transitioning from a development position into project/team management and above, there should be training/mentoring/etc. provided, but in terms of core tech skills I don't think formalized training is the way to go.
Should it really though? As developers/testers/whatever position we occupy in the tech space, most of us are pretty good at picking up new languages/technologies/frameworks/tools etc. in a pretty short amount of time.
Personally I think having well working teams with not only people of solid experience at the helm, but who have good communication skills and enjoy sharing knowledge, is far better in terms of developing juniors / new developers than simply sticking them on a few formalized training courses every year. Throw in collaborative 10%/20%/etc. time and you've a recipe for good development teams, in my opinion.
Now, when you're talking about transitioning from a development position into project/team management and above, there should be training/mentoring/etc. provided, but in terms of core tech skills I don't think formalized training is the way to go.
Should it really though? As developers/testers/whatever position we occupy in the tech space, most of us are pretty good at picking up new languages/technologies/frameworks/tools etc. in a pretty short amount of time.
Yes, it should exist. You've argued against whatever image of formalized training you seem to have a problem with, but provided a decent argument training (in general) should be provided. If developers are expected of to continually learn new things, and it can be done in a short amount of time, it is all the more reasonable for the business to treat that as training and budget time and money for it as such.
The types of gaining knowledge that you acknowledge in your post are "a few formalized training courses every year" and "good communication skills and enjoy sharing knowledge". You seem to be ignoring the large band of training that exist between those two. Which is also the where most ongoing learning happens.
Good communication skills and "collaborative time" allocated with percentages pulled from your rear is a fine (if slow) way to get people up to speed with the tech used at the office. But only serves to poorly normalize knowledge across the office.
Yes, it should exist. You've argued against whatever image of formalized training you seem to have a problem with, but provided a decent argument training (in general) should be provided. If developers are expected of to continually learn new things, and it can be done in a short amount of time, it is all the more reasonable for the business to treat that as training and budget time and money for it as such.
The types of gaining knowledge that you acknowledge in your post are "a few formalized training courses every year" and "good communication skills and enjoy sharing knowledge". You seem to be ignoring the large band of training that exist between those two. Which is also the where most ongoing learning happens.
Good communication skills and "collaborative time" allocated with percentages pulled from your rear is a fine (if slow) way to get people up to speed with the tech used at the office. But only serves to poorly normalize knowledge across the office.
> Should it really though? As developers/testers/whatever position we occupy in the tech space, most of us are pretty good at picking up new languages/technologies/frameworks/tools etc. in a pretty short amount of time.
Given the amount of loyalty companies expect workers to have and the possessiveness when they're hired away by better offers--to the point of calling it poaching, a word whose historical connotations are those of stealing animals from someone else's land!--yes, I think a modicum of giving a shit about your employees and deigning to train them is certainly in order. If you're going to treat people like chattel, at least treat them well.
Given the amount of loyalty companies expect workers to have and the possessiveness when they're hired away by better offers--to the point of calling it poaching, a word whose historical connotations are those of stealing animals from someone else's land!--yes, I think a modicum of giving a shit about your employees and deigning to train them is certainly in order. If you're going to treat people like chattel, at least treat them well.
Yeah it should. Feedback is good for learning and hopefully training has some of that. I don't think learning to code in a bubble where you can just get everything working is good long term. Code reviews alone are enough training for some people though.
most of us are pretty good at picking up new languages/technologies/frameworks/tools etc. in a pretty short amount of time
Isn't this the other way round? Because there isn't a reliable path to teaching programming to people who aren't self-motivated solo learners, that's the only kind of person who acquires the skills, and so when you look around a tech workplace that's the kind of person you see.
Isn't this the other way round? Because there isn't a reliable path to teaching programming to people who aren't self-motivated solo learners, that's the only kind of person who acquires the skills, and so when you look around a tech workplace that's the kind of person you see.
They mean experienced engineers who they can underpay. If they really needed more engineers, they would simply raise the price they were paying, and they'd have plenty of people by the end of next week.
Remote work would help out a lot, too.
Remote work would help out a lot, too.
It bothers me that Snapchat being "playful" is seen as a good thing. Please don't be playful when people are trusting you to do a job that is important to them, like delete their photos.
First, I find it pathetic that Snapchat has to use these kinds of sales tactics. Are they really that unable to find talent? The idea that there's hot demand for top talent is fucking absurd in an industry where engineers are thrown out by 40. There are plenty of good engineers out there who aren't earning half a million. Some are female, some are older than 40, and some didn't go to Stanford, but if you can't get past that, I don't know what to tell you.
Second, "playful" is often annoying, and I for one am fucking sick of the juvenility/neoteny of the tech industry. I didn't even like it when I was young and supposedly a beneficiary of it (I wanted people to look up to, and there were few, just as now) and I especially don't like it now that I'm "old" (31) by tech standards.
I want for us, as an industry, to get to work and solve hard problems, not be run by middle-aged underachievers who give millions of dollars to unqualified, juvenile hacks like Lucas Duplan and Evan Spiegel who come up with shitty ideas like this and think that it's cute.
First, I find it pathetic that Snapchat has to use these kinds of sales tactics. Are they really that unable to find talent? The idea that there's hot demand for top talent is fucking absurd in an industry where engineers are thrown out by 40. There are plenty of good engineers out there who aren't earning half a million. Some are female, some are older than 40, and some didn't go to Stanford, but if you can't get past that, I don't know what to tell you.
Second, "playful" is often annoying, and I for one am fucking sick of the juvenility/neoteny of the tech industry. I didn't even like it when I was young and supposedly a beneficiary of it (I wanted people to look up to, and there were few, just as now) and I especially don't like it now that I'm "old" (31) by tech standards.
I want for us, as an industry, to get to work and solve hard problems, not be run by middle-aged underachievers who give millions of dollars to unqualified, juvenile hacks like Lucas Duplan and Evan Spiegel who come up with shitty ideas like this and think that it's cute.
This attitude of "we can use your data for whatever we like" has to stop!
well then stop using their application? It asks for location access when you install it.
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Well if you don't pay for the app, the currency will be your data...
Why would it?
I'm sure the next step of this is someone commuting to work in an Uber finding it rolling up at Uber HQ instead. "You work here now."
(More seriously, I'm again going to suggest that employers should develop a football transfer-style market for programmers, along with football-level salaries)
(More seriously, I'm again going to suggest that employers should develop a football transfer-style market for programmers, along with football-level salaries)
The meta aspect should be fun: Startup Manager 2016.
Actually, the closest existing analog to that would probably be Game Dev Tycoon.
Actually, the closest existing analog to that would probably be Game Dev Tycoon.
Amazing. Just yesterday some colleagues and I were toying with the idea of creating a game called "Age of Startupts", an RTS game were you have to build your Technology Empire but starting with a simple "garage" and a couple of 'founders'.
As part of this hypothetical game you would have to develop technology, by building research centers and creating (sorry, I meant recruiting) Data Scientists and Engineers.
As the player keeps expanding, he would pass from the "mvp age" to "seed round age", then to "series A", "series B", "series C", until they get to the holy grail age of "IPO".
But as with any good RTS, the player would have to compete with other players. This will mainly be in the form of a priest^WCEO which will travel to the other startups to 'wololo' Engineers and DataScientists so that they work for him.
Another interesting option will be, the "secret agent", a guy (Eng, DS or Admin) who you can disguise as a unit from another player and leave in the middle of the enemy's Plex so that he believes that it is one of his units. Once the enemy player starts directing your 'camouflaged' unit you will be able to get new information about the adversaries.
Should make an interesting game haha.
As part of this hypothetical game you would have to develop technology, by building research centers and creating (sorry, I meant recruiting) Data Scientists and Engineers.
As the player keeps expanding, he would pass from the "mvp age" to "seed round age", then to "series A", "series B", "series C", until they get to the holy grail age of "IPO".
But as with any good RTS, the player would have to compete with other players. This will mainly be in the form of a priest^WCEO which will travel to the other startups to 'wololo' Engineers and DataScientists so that they work for him.
Another interesting option will be, the "secret agent", a guy (Eng, DS or Admin) who you can disguise as a unit from another player and leave in the middle of the enemy's Plex so that he believes that it is one of his units. Once the enemy player starts directing your 'camouflaged' unit you will be able to get new information about the adversaries.
Should make an interesting game haha.
So kind of GameDev Tycoon meets Capitalism meets Starcraft?
that sounds fun !
The fundraising part of this game would be NSFW. So you wouldn't get the play-at-the-office crowd that made Farmville what it was.
I would play the hell out of that, just like I did with Game Dev Tycoon!
Athletes are known for being extremely successful in collective bargaining and labor actions, both of which tend to be anathema to the software engineering community.
They also hire lawyers and agents to handle the negotiations that result in favorable working conditions and compensation. Maybe tech professionals should do the same?
We absolutely should.
We also have to look forward. Tech companies generate $500k per engineer even while those engineers are managed by idiots-- people who don't understand technology, don't value the wrong term, think "Scrum" is a good idea, and likely failed out of the mainstream business culture ("MBA culture") and are using the Valley as a second act.
Imagine what value the top software engineers could produce if they were managed well. And then imagine that software engineers would be even better at their job if major decisions were made by the right people.
This industry is running at 5% of its max potential, if that. Not only can we capture significantly more of the value that we create, but we can add substantially more value if we man up and learn how to take charge.
We also have to look forward. Tech companies generate $500k per engineer even while those engineers are managed by idiots-- people who don't understand technology, don't value the wrong term, think "Scrum" is a good idea, and likely failed out of the mainstream business culture ("MBA culture") and are using the Valley as a second act.
Imagine what value the top software engineers could produce if they were managed well. And then imagine that software engineers would be even better at their job if major decisions were made by the right people.
This industry is running at 5% of its max potential, if that. Not only can we capture significantly more of the value that we create, but we can add substantially more value if we man up and learn how to take charge.
^ s/wrong/long/
It tends to be anathema to most "white collar" workers which is a shame, the concept of organized labor is beneficial to all workers.
Organized labor is great when you've got a local labor monopsony (one-buyer) which is exploiting your work. This was clearly the case in many company towns back in the organized-labor movement's heyday, and still has relevance to groups like public school teachers, but the last figures I've seen say that economists estimate that the average rate of exploitation in the US at large is somewhere roughly between 1%-3% (because switching firms is an expensive proposition).
There's a reason that labor union membership is at an all-time low, and yet here we are with the labor movement trying to double down on a 19th-century solution to our 21st-century problems. The concept of organized labor is more beneficial today to robots than it is to Americans -- robots, and imports from developing nations.
We won't even get into all of favors the labor movement hasn't done itself on various topics, either, like union leaders paid executive-like compensation or the Teamsters' ties to organized crime.
There's a reason that labor union membership is at an all-time low, and yet here we are with the labor movement trying to double down on a 19th-century solution to our 21st-century problems. The concept of organized labor is more beneficial today to robots than it is to Americans -- robots, and imports from developing nations.
We won't even get into all of favors the labor movement hasn't done itself on various topics, either, like union leaders paid executive-like compensation or the Teamsters' ties to organized crime.
> economists estimate that the average rate of exploitation in the US at large is somewhere roughly between 1%-3% (because switching firms is an expensive proposition).
Average, possibly, but that's definitely low for certain sectors, eg workers on an H1-B visa. It also doesn't help when firms collude to make switching firms even harder, eg: when Adobe, Apple, Google, Intel, Intuit, Pixar, Lucasfilm and eBay agreed not to recruit each other's employees.*
To think organized labor is antiquated because the economy has moved on from single-company mining towns is naive. The simple fact is that corporations don't have your best interest in mind any more than you can claim you always have your employer's best interests at heart.
*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_Li...
Average, possibly, but that's definitely low for certain sectors, eg workers on an H1-B visa. It also doesn't help when firms collude to make switching firms even harder, eg: when Adobe, Apple, Google, Intel, Intuit, Pixar, Lucasfilm and eBay agreed not to recruit each other's employees.*
To think organized labor is antiquated because the economy has moved on from single-company mining towns is naive. The simple fact is that corporations don't have your best interest in mind any more than you can claim you always have your employer's best interests at heart.
*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_Li...
> The simple fact is that corporations don't have your best interest in mind any more than you can claim you always have your employer's best interests at heart.
This is true. It also applies to the labor union, and to the government.
This is true. It also applies to the labor union, and to the government.
> and still has relevance to groups like public school teachers
I can't believe that we're on opposite sides of the teachers' union issue.
I can't believe that we're on opposite sides of the teachers' union issue.
Well, I think it's important to start with an ounce of sympathy, as it builds understanding. Public schools are run by legislatures and school boards and the like, typically being reviewed by annual-at-best election (with crap turnout, for races that few will actually follow, and many of the advantages of incumbency available. The decision-makers are not incentivized to care very much about the quality of their decisions.
Moreover, they're probably the only employers in the county (maybe the whole state) and the entire business has ultra-long highly-scheduled hiring cycles -- none of this "can you start tomorrow?" business like you get in tech.
That is a recipe whereby good performance is not linked to good pay at all and has very high potential for abuse. Would you trust someone employed by that sort of a bureaucracy to evaluate your performance at your job? I'd prefer not to, myself.
So there are a few ways to approach this. Teachers could just sit there and take it -- you can understand why they don't care to do so, surely. We could structure the system to have a lot of objective evaluations to curb abuses -- an approach still fraught with many issues (standardized tests and certificates which fail to capture many of the most important aspects of pedagogy). As a final set of options, we could either try to ameliorate some of the worst of all this by restructuring the system to have more options and employers for teachers (charter schools, private schools, etc), or we could double down on the status quo while avoiding any evaluations on teaching whatsoever, leaving failing schools in place to ruin the lives of entire generations of students (blaming either Funding or Parents).
It is mostly in the choice of the last option over the penultimate option that there is a major problem -- teachers' unions paying dues to spend on the election cycle to elect union-friendly politicians. This means that the right sort of incumbent essentially gets to spend tax money on his own campaign, and it goes downhill from there into an orgy of corruption, power games, and detachment from responsibility -- aka "politics".
Moreover, they're probably the only employers in the county (maybe the whole state) and the entire business has ultra-long highly-scheduled hiring cycles -- none of this "can you start tomorrow?" business like you get in tech.
That is a recipe whereby good performance is not linked to good pay at all and has very high potential for abuse. Would you trust someone employed by that sort of a bureaucracy to evaluate your performance at your job? I'd prefer not to, myself.
So there are a few ways to approach this. Teachers could just sit there and take it -- you can understand why they don't care to do so, surely. We could structure the system to have a lot of objective evaluations to curb abuses -- an approach still fraught with many issues (standardized tests and certificates which fail to capture many of the most important aspects of pedagogy). As a final set of options, we could either try to ameliorate some of the worst of all this by restructuring the system to have more options and employers for teachers (charter schools, private schools, etc), or we could double down on the status quo while avoiding any evaluations on teaching whatsoever, leaving failing schools in place to ruin the lives of entire generations of students (blaming either Funding or Parents).
It is mostly in the choice of the last option over the penultimate option that there is a major problem -- teachers' unions paying dues to spend on the election cycle to elect union-friendly politicians. This means that the right sort of incumbent essentially gets to spend tax money on his own campaign, and it goes downhill from there into an orgy of corruption, power games, and detachment from responsibility -- aka "politics".
Support a $15 minimum wage! Support the FUTURE!
https://www.facebook.com/Robots4MinimumWage
https://www.facebook.com/Robots4MinimumWage
> Athletes are known for being extremely successful in collective bargaining and labor actions, [...]
Really? Is that an American thing?
Really? Is that an American thing?
Hmm. https://investor.google.com/financial/tables.html
Divide $14Bn net income by 53,600 employees gives about $260k. So GOOG could roughly double their salaries and remain profitable. Is that enough to overcome anathema?
Edit: the real thing is that athletes' past performance is very rankable - Moneyball etc passim. Winners are paid on an exponential curve. Programmer performance is not only not rankable, it's barely measureable and interviewers have to resort to silly tests. So it becomes worthwhile to poach people that have already been through someone else's FizzBuzz filter.
The nearest thing to the transfer market is the acquihire/acquishutdown.
Divide $14Bn net income by 53,600 employees gives about $260k. So GOOG could roughly double their salaries and remain profitable. Is that enough to overcome anathema?
Edit: the real thing is that athletes' past performance is very rankable - Moneyball etc passim. Winners are paid on an exponential curve. Programmer performance is not only not rankable, it's barely measureable and interviewers have to resort to silly tests. So it becomes worthwhile to poach people that have already been through someone else's FizzBuzz filter.
The nearest thing to the transfer market is the acquihire/acquishutdown.
>Divide $14Bn net income by 53,600 employees gives about $260k. So GOOG could roughly double their salaries and remain profitable.
That doesn't make any sense. If Google disburses that $14B Net Income as salary/bonus to the employees, the Net Income would be $0. One can't have it both ways, unless you illogically count that money twice.
Besides the issue of recategorizing "net income" as "employee expense", Google wouldn't have new money to invest in the business as an ongoing concern. That $14B can be used in future years to invest in driverless cars, satellites, global internet hot air balloons, acquisitions of other companies, or whatever ambitious plans they have.
Disbursing the Net Income to their employees means Google would cease to exist as a viable ongoing business.
One can also look backward and see why and how companies get formed in the first place. If angel investors and venture capitalists knew from the beginning that Google was going to disburse all Net Income to employees, they would have never invested $$$ in 1998 to let them grow. Angels and VC's are not charities and they want ROI -- because things like pension funds that utilize VC's want an ROI.
From that birth of the company, the chain of events continued: a big reason why Google has $14B of net income in 2014 is that they did not disburse the net incomes to employees in previous years 2013, 2012, 2011...2000. They were able to spend previous profits to build new datacenters, offer 1 gigabyte GMail accounts, acquire Keyhole maps, etc.
That doesn't make any sense. If Google disburses that $14B Net Income as salary/bonus to the employees, the Net Income would be $0. One can't have it both ways, unless you illogically count that money twice.
Besides the issue of recategorizing "net income" as "employee expense", Google wouldn't have new money to invest in the business as an ongoing concern. That $14B can be used in future years to invest in driverless cars, satellites, global internet hot air balloons, acquisitions of other companies, or whatever ambitious plans they have.
Disbursing the Net Income to their employees means Google would cease to exist as a viable ongoing business.
One can also look backward and see why and how companies get formed in the first place. If angel investors and venture capitalists knew from the beginning that Google was going to disburse all Net Income to employees, they would have never invested $$$ in 1998 to let them grow. Angels and VC's are not charities and they want ROI -- because things like pension funds that utilize VC's want an ROI.
From that birth of the company, the chain of events continued: a big reason why Google has $14B of net income in 2014 is that they did not disburse the net incomes to employees in previous years 2013, 2012, 2011...2000. They were able to spend previous profits to build new datacenters, offer 1 gigabyte GMail accounts, acquire Keyhole maps, etc.
So why are Google disbursing $124m in executive compensation that could be used to build the business? http://ibnlive.in.com/news/google-ceo-larry-page-paid-1-sala... Rhetorical question, of course.
Yes, there should have been an "up to" in my previous comment. Obviously there is a tradeoff between investing retained profits, returning money to investors, and increasing staff compensation; that's what Ford v Dodge was all about.
Yes, there should have been an "up to" in my previous comment. Obviously there is a tradeoff between investing retained profits, returning money to investors, and increasing staff compensation; that's what Ford v Dodge was all about.
>So why are Google disbursing $124m in executive compensation that could be used to build the business?
I understand that you said it was a rhetorical question but I'll attempt to answer anyway.
To the mindset of Larry Page and the board, they are building the business by paying the $124m to those executives. They may be proven wrong but that is how they think. Those payments are not gifts. They are not a free ride to let the executives slack off. The compensation is to prevent key people from leaving and incentivize them to create additional value. This is another component of "building the business" and they would hope that $124m will multiply itself if the managers execute the business plans in a competent manner.
(Btw, I didn't downvote your posts.)
I understand that you said it was a rhetorical question but I'll attempt to answer anyway.
To the mindset of Larry Page and the board, they are building the business by paying the $124m to those executives. They may be proven wrong but that is how they think. Those payments are not gifts. They are not a free ride to let the executives slack off. The compensation is to prevent key people from leaving and incentivize them to create additional value. This is another component of "building the business" and they would hope that $124m will multiply itself if the managers execute the business plans in a competent manner.
(Btw, I didn't downvote your posts.)
> To the mindset of Larry Page and the board, they are building the business by paying the $124m to those executives
And they wouldn't be building the business by paying more for engineers instead of whining about H1-B restrictions?
And they wouldn't be building the business by paying more for engineers instead of whining about H1-B restrictions?
>And they wouldn't be building the business by paying more for engineers
Sure, they would be but like any business with a finite amount of money, they apparently feel they get more bang-for-the-buck by paying $124m to executives rather than divide that $124m as a +$3100 pay raise to all non-management employees.
They also feel that paying $124m to key people is smarter than reducing Net Income by billions to afford paying $300k/year salaries to all non-management programmers.
Google may be wrong with the above analysis but based on their actions, that's what they think. Like many other companies, it is implicit in their thinking that there is a law of diminishing returns if they pay much more in programmer salaries than they're already paying now. (Therefore, they think the bigger levers of growth is paying the management team to execute their business goals.)
Since we don't have multiple alternate universes to experiment which scenario would be the best, we can only approximate which profits-vs-compensation structure would be the most effective by looking at different existing companies.
Gravity Payments has a lot of recent press for setting $70k minimum wage. If they can compete and grow to be on par with, or beat other companies like PayPal, Apple Pay, Stripe, etc AND their unconventional salary structure is credited with making it happen, you'd have some evidence that Google Inc's compensation system is wrong. On the other side of the coin, when some observers see that founder David Price is giving up money to pay employees more, they would assume he does not have new business ideas that could use that money. It may be unfair to view it that way but it's a market signal nevertheless especially since another CEO like Jeff Bezos is reinvesting virtually all profits back into Amazon. The market thinks "Jeff has new ideas for putting capital to work; David does not."
Sure, they would be but like any business with a finite amount of money, they apparently feel they get more bang-for-the-buck by paying $124m to executives rather than divide that $124m as a +$3100 pay raise to all non-management employees.
They also feel that paying $124m to key people is smarter than reducing Net Income by billions to afford paying $300k/year salaries to all non-management programmers.
Google may be wrong with the above analysis but based on their actions, that's what they think. Like many other companies, it is implicit in their thinking that there is a law of diminishing returns if they pay much more in programmer salaries than they're already paying now. (Therefore, they think the bigger levers of growth is paying the management team to execute their business goals.)
Since we don't have multiple alternate universes to experiment which scenario would be the best, we can only approximate which profits-vs-compensation structure would be the most effective by looking at different existing companies.
Gravity Payments has a lot of recent press for setting $70k minimum wage. If they can compete and grow to be on par with, or beat other companies like PayPal, Apple Pay, Stripe, etc AND their unconventional salary structure is credited with making it happen, you'd have some evidence that Google Inc's compensation system is wrong. On the other side of the coin, when some observers see that founder David Price is giving up money to pay employees more, they would assume he does not have new business ideas that could use that money. It may be unfair to view it that way but it's a market signal nevertheless especially since another CEO like Jeff Bezos is reinvesting virtually all profits back into Amazon. The market thinks "Jeff has new ideas for putting capital to work; David does not."
Earlier in the thread you said that if Google paid out more money in employee compensation, it'd have less money to invest in the business. But then you tried to categorize executive compensation as investing in the business. My point is that both should be in the same bucket,[1] instead of thinking of employee compensation as an expense while executive compensation is an investment.
[1] Though IMHO both belong in the "expenses" bucket, not the "investment" bucket.
[1] Though IMHO both belong in the "expenses" bucket, not the "investment" bucket.
>But then you tried to categorize executive compensation as investing in the business.
No, what happened was 2 separate conversations took place because one topic morphed into another.
My original reply to pjc50 was over the formal accounting label of profits-vs-expense. His scenario of paying out the Net Income while still retaining profits is mathematically impossible -- unless you do Enron type of accounting. (pjc50 later clarified he didn't mean all of the $14B would be paid to employees.)
On the other hand, I interpreted pjc50 and your usage of "building the business" as a different topic that transcends accounting labels to talk about what's good/bad/effective/moral/whatever for the business regardless of what bucket it's in. In other words, I took a charitable reading and basically agreed that expenses for employees can also "build the business" -- I simply put it in a larger framework of business "priorities" because they have finite resources.
No, what happened was 2 separate conversations took place because one topic morphed into another.
My original reply to pjc50 was over the formal accounting label of profits-vs-expense. His scenario of paying out the Net Income while still retaining profits is mathematically impossible -- unless you do Enron type of accounting. (pjc50 later clarified he didn't mean all of the $14B would be paid to employees.)
On the other hand, I interpreted pjc50 and your usage of "building the business" as a different topic that transcends accounting labels to talk about what's good/bad/effective/moral/whatever for the business regardless of what bucket it's in. In other words, I took a charitable reading and basically agreed that expenses for employees can also "build the business" -- I simply put it in a larger framework of business "priorities" because they have finite resources.
Why do you care about employing Americans--who already won the birthplace lottery--before other people?
Of course those receiving the money would consider it an "investment" and "building the business".
Football level salaries are pretty low for all but the top performers.
If you rank footballers by skill, and programmers by skill, I bet you dollars to donuts that on the same rank the programmer earns way more (in general) than the footballer.
Top programmers' salaries are just way less publicized than top footballers earnings.
Why would we need a transfer market? Would would we want our employers to capture that value?
If you rank footballers by skill, and programmers by skill, I bet you dollars to donuts that on the same rank the programmer earns way more (in general) than the footballer.
Top programmers' salaries are just way less publicized than top footballers earnings.
Why would we need a transfer market? Would would we want our employers to capture that value?
Incoming Uber notification to everyone dropped off at Snapchat HQ...
I want to be annoyed by this, but it's pretty clever I guess.
Snapchat may see this as "playful", and I doubt they gave it too much thought. I see it as putting their business interests before their users's privacy, and I think it's a breach of trust (however minor).
The core problem is that even if Snapchat grows up enough to put some internal restrictions in place that prevent using end user data in this way, there will always be another company that has access to the same data with no compunctions about how to use it.
I wish that societal pressure could put a stop to this sort of thing, but it seems pretty unlikely to happen. I think the only way to prevent misuse of end user data is if companies can't gather it in the first place.
The core problem is that even if Snapchat grows up enough to put some internal restrictions in place that prevent using end user data in this way, there will always be another company that has access to the same data with no compunctions about how to use it.
I wish that societal pressure could put a stop to this sort of thing, but it seems pretty unlikely to happen. I think the only way to prevent misuse of end user data is if companies can't gather it in the first place.
With all due respect, you are way blowing this out of proportion. This is the same thing as Snapchat currently supports — a silly little sticker based on your location. Just because it's an advertisement instead of Big Ben doesn't make it any more of a "breach of privacy".
Is this just not doing the same as the app currently does? It takes your location and provides a number of filters based on that. I'm not sure how them providing a filter around uber's location is any different, in regards to a users's privacy, to them providing a filter when you are in Paris for example
It balances out against the advantage to the engineer being poached (presumably to be better compensated). It's like targeted ads - sure, they breach on your privacy, but at least you get semi-useful stuff instead of total junk.
I can't imagine getting enticed away from a job by this kind of maneuver. All of these people are already, without exception, aware of Snapchat's existence. They probably also know that Snapchat, like everywhere else, is hiring like mad.
In terms of feeding the applicant pool, this is probably even less effective than the constant stream of LinkedIn recruiter mail. And more privacy invasive to boot.
Snapchat's target audience here also lives in the wrong city, since the article claims they are targeting Uber HQ in San Francisco. Snapchat's office is in LA.
In terms of feeding the applicant pool, this is probably even less effective than the constant stream of LinkedIn recruiter mail. And more privacy invasive to boot.
Snapchat's target audience here also lives in the wrong city, since the article claims they are targeting Uber HQ in San Francisco. Snapchat's office is in LA.
I think some people in this thread are misunderstanding what they are doing. They are not reading people's snaps to profile if they are a top engineer and then send them job offers.
They are using a feature, where if you are in Paris you can add a sticker of the Eiffel tower to your pictures, if you're in Egypt you can add the pyramids and if you are near the office of uber you (that is anybody) can add little taxis to your pictures.
It's a cute feature, where if somebody adds Big Ben to a snap, you know he is in London. It encourages people to snap "in the moment" lest they forgo a cute sticker, but since it is just a sticker, you can hardly say they are forcing anyone to snap more.
They are using a feature, where if you are in Paris you can add a sticker of the Eiffel tower to your pictures, if you're in Egypt you can add the pyramids and if you are near the office of uber you (that is anybody) can add little taxis to your pictures.
It's a cute feature, where if somebody adds Big Ben to a snap, you know he is in London. It encourages people to snap "in the moment" lest they forgo a cute sticker, but since it is just a sticker, you can hardly say they are forcing anyone to snap more.
If it were simply little Uber cars driving around and nothing else, I would not take issue with it.
Okay, so it's an image of uber cars and some text.
I wonder how much this was driven by SnapChats HR needs vs being a beta for SnapChat sales to show how you can build super unique targeted advertising. Couldn't Nike do a cute "unhappy with you Kicks?" And show a ghost in Nikes whenever someone was within 200 feet of a Footlocker? This advertising seems like an incredible advancement over anything we've seen (because it's real -.they're doing it)
That's what I was thinking too. Just imagine all the potential that these sorts of snaps can have, especially given their audience which is often considered to be one of the most valuable [1]. Could be something as simple as a local ad for a mall or a country wide ad for a new film for example.
[1] http://www.inc.com/issie-lapowsky/inside-massive-tech-land-g...
[1] http://www.inc.com/issie-lapowsky/inside-massive-tech-land-g...
Good way to get ban in any corporation. Snapchat is stealing our data and our employees...
What data are they stealing? The user has to give them permission to access their location.
How are they "stealing" employees? Are they not people, and perfectly capable of making their own decision on where they want to work? If any company is bitching about having employees "stolen", maybe they need to do less bitching, and more looking at why people are wanting to leave.
I don't find it sneaky, and since it doesn't expose what's supposed to be a private and short-lived message (image) I also don't think it's "snooping". Geo-location is with us whether we like it or not. If you don't want applications knowing where you are, don't install them or turn off geo-location on your phone (yes ... this will break things).
It's a prank! Giving a company their own geofilter seems like a fun tribute in a way.
Clearly not an anomaly – one app I've used (which loads my data from FB) popped a message saying "We're looking for engineers like you" (I studied CS at a top-ranked school).
This is amusing but not really new. When I worked as a site reliability engineer for Google here in London, I would get ads on Facebook reading "Come and work for Facebook as an SRE in London".
I was always amused by the specificity of the targeting, since there were only about six of us at the time, but I suppose they did the same thing on a much larger scale in the bay area.
I was always amused by the specificity of the targeting, since there were only about six of us at the time, but I suppose they did the same thing on a much larger scale in the bay area.
Why Uber?
The article suggests that, since both companies are founded by Stanford grads, they have similar social networks and so are drawing on the same pool of talent.
I have no idea if that is true or not. My two cents are, "why do you think its just Uber?" Its cheap to add filters, maybe they have them for Google, Apple, Facebook, etc. Maybe having one for direct competitors like WhatsApp is a bit much.
I have no idea if that is true or not. My two cents are, "why do you think its just Uber?" Its cheap to add filters, maybe they have them for Google, Apple, Facebook, etc. Maybe having one for direct competitors like WhatsApp is a bit much.
Snapchat responded saying that its not just Uber.
They're targeting any company that fits into their potential talent pool. Its easy and cheap, the hardest part being the artwork.
We also have no idea where they're targeting, since the geofilters are a call to Snapchat's servers.
They're targeting any company that fits into their potential talent pool. Its easy and cheap, the hardest part being the artwork.
We also have no idea where they're targeting, since the geofilters are a call to Snapchat's servers.
1. Uber owns their engineers
2. Snapchat is trespassing on some kind of "territory" and attempting to "steal" Uber's property
3. The engineers involved are like fish or game, simply being taken away by someone else
If someone chooses to go to work for another company, they aren't being "poached". They're informed participants in a business transaction, not to mention a major life event. They are voluntarily severing one business arrangement and entering into another one. This whole idea that when you go to work for a company, you turn in to some pheasant owned by the property's lord should be revolting to anyone who's worked hard on their career and their professional development.
Just stick with the word "recruit." Leave out "poach" and its negative and demeaning connotations.
EDIT: Typo