I've seen a lot of complaints about the interview process at Google. One core issue to me seems to be that they outsource a lot of their recruiting. Another may be the metrics. Hiring the equivalent of gym membership salespeople to do recruiting has issues.
On the other side, I've only had very positive interactions with Google recruiting. When you have a company growing so fast in both relative and absolute numbers, you're likely to run into some issues.
In the broader sense, technical people have to stay relevant. I was recently helping a Phd data scientist try to get a new job. When I suggested that he learn Python to augment his SQL, he said he was too old to learn new tricks. After hearing that I new he wouldn't be of use in my firm, or many others.
The flip side is that the people who do stay relevant and have all the experience are enormously valuable. Someone who is programming in Python or Ruby on Rails that also had to learn Assembler and C will have enormous insights into performance and what's going on in the guts of the machine. Those types of folks can solve problems other don't even know how to frame. It's hard to find 21 year olds with such breadth.
On the other side, I've only had very positive interactions with Google recruiting. When you have a company growing so fast in both relative and absolute numbers, you're likely to run into some issues.
In the broader sense, technical people have to stay relevant. I was recently helping a Phd data scientist try to get a new job. When I suggested that he learn Python to augment his SQL, he said he was too old to learn new tricks. After hearing that I new he wouldn't be of use in my firm, or many others.
The flip side is that the people who do stay relevant and have all the experience are enormously valuable. Someone who is programming in Python or Ruby on Rails that also had to learn Assembler and C will have enormous insights into performance and what's going on in the guts of the machine. Those types of folks can solve problems other don't even know how to frame. It's hard to find 21 year olds with such breadth.