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Google Businesses Technology

Google Tells Employees That Fewer of Them Will Get Promotions To Senior Roles (cnbc.com) 61

Posted by msmash from the tough-luck dept.
Google is warning employees that fewer of them will receive promotions to more senior levels this year than in the past. From a report: "The process is manager-led and will be largely similar to last year -- though with our slower pace of hiring, we are planning for fewer promotions into L6 and above than when Google was growing quickly," the company said in an email that was viewed by CNBC. The L6 distinction refers to the first layer of staff that's considered senior and typically includes people with about a decade of experience. The changes come as Google implements a new performance review system called Google Reviews and Development (GRAD), which as CNBC reported in December, will result in more Google employees receiving low performance ratings and fewer receiving high marks.

Like many large tech companies, Google has a sprawling middle management. According to last year's internal survey results that affected the company's ability to ship products efficiently. Google also is in the midst of trying to cut costs as growth decelerates and recession concerns persist. The company has slowed hiring and announced in January that it's cutting 12,000 jobs, or about 6% of the workforce. In Monday's email, the tech giant said it's promoting fewer people to senior roles "to ensure that the number of Googlers in more senior and leadership roles grows in proportion to the growth of the company."
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Google Tells Employees That Fewer of Them Will Get Promotions To Senior Roles More

Google Tells Employees That Fewer of Them Will Get Promotions To Senior Roles

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  • are they an UP or OUT workplace? peter or dilbert system for putting people into management?

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward

      You want an UP or OUT environment - go work for a major consulting company... Accenture*, Ernst & Young, McKinsey, Deloitte, etc. Been there, done that - escaped before I was Borg'ed.

      * Scott Adams based much of Dilbert's mentality on his interaction with Anderson Consulting (pre-Enron).

      UP and OUT is not necessarily bad if your goal is to force an ultra-competitive management environment. Unfortunately, not all the cream at the top is savory as a lot of dicks get involved.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • This is news?? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dentar ( 6540 ) on Wednesday March 08, 2023 @11:25AM (#63353219) Homepage Journal

    Corporate culture needs to quit telling people that they have promotion opportunities when they don't.

    • Why? If people are still stupid enough to swallow it, why stop selling snake oil while people are still willing to buy?

    • Corporate culture needs to quit telling people that they have promotion opportunities when they don't.

      The opportunities are there for everyone...just no guarantee that YOU will be promoted.

  • So they'll be training up people... (Score:3)

    by AmazingRuss ( 555076 ) on Wednesday March 08, 2023 @11:34AM (#63353235)
    ... for their competitors.

    • ... for their competitors.

      Show me 1 company that trains it's people to do more than exactly what they were hired for.

      I worked the last 10 years of my working life at a MAJOR CORP that made no effort to train/improve it's staff...unlike a major corp that was merged into it decades before.

      • These aren't paper pushers. They're creating new software, and learning how it works and why it's marketable as they build it. Everything they build makes them an expert in that tech.

  • I give odds on about 2 years before executives at tech companies just come right out and say, "Work harder, or we will be around to beat you."

    I miss the good old days when they just flat out lied about opportunities for growth. At least we could pretend to have hope then.

    • I said it before, I say it again, some managers are just still alive because they simply aren't worth a second of jail time.

  • ...it's almost like they suddenly realized that 'performance trophies for everyone' is ultimately expensive and motivates people in entirely the wrong direction.

    The google hq should have been shaped like a giant snowflake.

  • Move if it mattersâ¦. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by boxless ( 35756 ) on Wednesday March 08, 2023 @11:59AM (#63353301)

    If this matters to you, then look elsewhere. You are almost always more valuable to another company than your current employer. You will get more money and a new title if thatâ(TM)s what you want.

    If these things donâ(TM)t matter, then forget about it.

    Yes, I know there have been a lot of layoffs, so there might be slim pickinâ(TM)s out there for new work. But, itâ(TM)s a big economy. Iâ(TM)m sure you can find something decent. Just get started.

    • This right there.

      You want more money? Get another job. The only times my salary leaped forwards was when I jumped ship and signed up with another company.

  • I have this sense that everyone here is going to think that an organisation is nothing but an endless string of promotion to senior management and that all it takes is time to get there. If your own goal at work is to get promoted you're setting yourself up for an statistically incredibly likely failure.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Junta ( 36770 )

      Conversely, in some places explicitly, others informally a given, if you *don't* get promoted, you will get let go.

    • Can I have a show of hands who got promoted in the last, say, 2 years? Well?

      Nobody gets promoted anymore. Nobody promotes from the inside. For a few simple reasons, it would require you to actually train someone and you would also have to justify why it's Bob and not Fred. Or worse, why it's not Jessica.

      Instead, if there's a senior position or a supervisor position to be filled, you hire from the outside.

      Forget the idea that you'll ever be promoted. You want to be promoted? Dust off your resume and apply to

    • They can pump a couple years of life force out of you before you figure it out though.

  • A 'sprawling middle management' is a bad sign, and kind of surprising for a company that's supposed to be slick and modern. Tech companies these days tend to have a pretty flat hierarchy. I realize that's harder to do if the organization is large, but a hefty layer of middle management is usually costly and counterproductive.

    People want to be promoted and climb the corporate ladder, but in a lot of places there isn't much of a ladder.

    • A 'sprawling middle management' is a bad sign, and kind of surprising for a company that's supposed to be slick and modern. Tech companies these days tend to have a pretty flat hierarchy. I realize that's harder to do if the organization is large, but a hefty layer of middle management is usually costly and counterproductive.

      People want to be promoted and climb the corporate ladder, but in a lot of places there isn't much of a ladder.

      ^THIS^

    • These are the people that originally championed the hell that is the Open Office Plan. Not all their ideas are winners.

      • That open plan bullshit is one of the reasons employees are now fighting the return to office tooth and nail. That idea would have a lot more appeal if we still had normal offices.

        If open plan was such a great idea, you'd see C-Levels work there. Well, where do they work? If they're at the office at all?

  • Can someone who understands this better explain it to me? One of the companies where I worked had a "tech ladder," where people were "promoted" to a higher title, but didn't actually manage anyone. That tech ladder was tied in to how much you were paid, what kinds of bonuses/RSUs you could possibly earn. There was an explicit target for the number of people at each job grade or rung on the "tech ladder" with the expectation that some people might never achieve beyond a certain point in their entire caree

  • Pichai wants bigger bonus for himself while moving the work to India.
    He is pulling a GE.
  • So I guess this is the other shoe dropping....
  • The "corporate ladder" is a Ponzi scheme.

    The only ones who truly make it are the ones at the top and they do so by convincing the people at the bottom that they can all make it to the top as long as they "play the game". Which is clearly not possible. Every rung of the latter weeds out approximately 80% of the folks below it (assuming each manager has fiver reports).

    The only time the worker bees have a chance is when a company is young and growing fast. And, let's face it, the tech industry ain't youn

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