Google: Best tech place to work in 2010
Glassdoor.com published their best places to work for the coming year yesterday, highlighting a number of key technology companies in the top 50.
At the top, Southwest Airlines with a rating of 4.7 out of 5.0 (classifying it as employees being "very satisfied") with Google ranking at number 14. The company, famed for its practical jokes and revolutionary workplace style, slips 7 places since last year, yet still ranking higher than Apple, Intel and SAP America, at 22, 41 and 43 respectively.
Adobe seems to be the biggest slip, dropping 26 places, after employees said that the "technology is limited to their cloistered family of products", such as Flash, Reader and AIR, and others blame the management and boards for lack of sales for products which don't seem to generate much revenue.
However, Google isn't exempt from the grilling after accusations of people skills ranging from "arrogant and stubborn co-workers" to "middle managers with little by way of people skills"; these could well be personal perspectives from individuals and may not represent the wider picture.
The restructuring issues are not unique to Google, as my time at Microsoft seemingly all those years ago was dogged by management reshuffles and reorganisation which never seemed to benefit anybody or any of the products in the long run. On the other hand I wasn't there long enough to see the changes in full effect.
Microsoft does not appear in the top 50, yet has a rating of 3.6 (classifying it as employees being "satisfied") based on just under a thousand reviews. In the long battle between the companies, Google can chime a victory in this area for being the better workforce to be part of.
Google employees' average salary ranges between $32,000 - $40,000 and $140,000 - $202,000 for jobs including group product managers and directors, while Microsoft's average salary at the moment seems to be stable between $44,000-$48,000 a year and $160,000 - $203,000 for the higher paid jobs such as senior attorneys and senior directors. (Estimations are rough, only; never been great with maths).
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