My Experience Visiting the Google Office
I am not a tech worker nor associated with tech in any way. This post is not indicative of tech people in general, just the people I know.
“Jesus. You guys have a better spread of gender in the New Zealand office,” he said. “Back in Silicon Valley, it’s just all dudes. Forever.”
My friend from Silicon Valley made it very clear that he doesn’t work for Google. The parent company, Alphabet, has a major controlling stake in the startup he’s working at, which allows him access to the Google offices around the world. He invited me to catchup with him over lunch.
“They say you’re not meant to bring people in more than twice a month, but nobody respects that rule. I bring my wife to work every Friday. It’s free food.”
It was my first time being in a big Silicon Valley office. I’ve been to many corporate places before, but nothing to the level of the Big G. After a quick office tour, I was led to the cafeteria. A big espresso machine with a selection of syrups sat waiting for me.
“This is so disappointing,” he said. “Back in Cali, a barista would stand here and make the coffee for us. I can’t imagine making your own.”
I made a wry joke about making coffee for him (I don’t do espresso, filter is my jam), but he quickly shook his head.
“No, no, no. I’ve seen the barista do it enough times. How hard can it be?”
The dosage he applied into his portafilter was wrong. I wanted to say something, but by then he had tamped it unevenly and screwed it on.
“It’s this button, right?”
He didn’t wait for my reply before pressing it. Boiling water started squirting out the sides of the portafilter and down into his cup.
“…I wanted an Americano anyway.”
He took the coffee cup back to the table. I grabbed a feijoa and apple drink and joined him.
The Google Bike. They told me that they're way more tattered and shabby at Silicon Valley since they get used so much there.
We caught up for the next few hours over lunch which was a supplied buffet of incredibly tasty and healthy foods. (I decided to refrain from posting my photos) All this was free, or as I knew it, provided to try and keep them at the company. My friend told me—to very little surprise—that healthier foods meant they were more productive. The company didn’t want them to waste mental energy deciding/calculating what to eat when they could be thinking about work.
“It’s different here at the Auckland Office,” he said. “We have way more specialized foods at Silicon Valley. Broader selection over all, but lower quality. Here you guys just choose between a few but it’s a lot nicer.”
A few other employees joined as well. Connections seemed easy between them. Their topics were all the same: Stocks. Money. Marriage. Dogs and children.
“Our startup is bleeding so much money,” he said.
“I mean, no startup needs to make money, right?” said another. “Remember, we’re just here to tough it out.”
I mentioned that I didn’t quite understand what they meant.
“To get bought up. We’re waiting for everything to go public.”
I realized it meant they all had shares. Some of them told me they pumped three years worth of salary into the shares. Big cash out soon.
“I’ve got more than fifty percent of my net worth leveraged in them,” said one of them. “Not a good idea, in hindsight.”
“All depends on your risk assessment, right?”
“Yeah, I sold some during the last liquidation since we don’t know when the next one is going to come around. But I really need it to cash out. We’ve got a really really high valuation right now…but oh my god what if it goes even higher? Then I won’t make as much money!”
The lawyer at the table sucked air through his teeth. “Don’t even talk to me about high valuations. That doesn’t mean jack shit. I did work for [redacted] and they were overvalued by…uhh, was it 10x or 100x—”
I joked that it was just a zero. The table erupted with laughter and agreed. It was just a zero, so who cares where they put it? A part of me felt very hollow.
“They got their valuation pushed back down. Bunch of people bled money.”
“It’s fine,” said another. “Won’t happen to us. We’re just going to cash out and be rich.”
This type of conversation continued for a very long time. It didn't matter what they worked on. They were just biding their time for the startups to get bought out.
When they spoke, there was a quiet desperation to their voices. "This is why [our product] is good. We're targeting [current big audience] but with [small difference here] and we expect people will pay [X amount more]."
They were bleeding mass amounts of money. Didn't matter though. The next fundraiser was just along the corner.
They just needed to be bought out.
The Google products on display. "Don't even bother," said my friend. "They laid off these people."
Their dreams were all identical. Big house. Suburbia. Early retirement. I asked what they would do once retired, but they just shrugged. It didn’t matter. The point was the retirement.
“You should join us. I get a good referral for bringing you in. Used to be 10k, but they dropped it recently.”
I laughed. At which point I told them that I didn’t work in tech. I also confessed that we did not share the same dreams. I wanted to live in the city. They could not fathom the idea.
“It’s nice and quiet here!” And then, with the straightest face possible, “All my neighbours are white!”
When I said I wanted to live with other people, they replied, “My friends are only thirty minutes away by car! So close!”
You know how it goes. Whenever people like me talk about trams and infrastructure, they always reply, “Yeah, but America is just too big!”
Anyway, I didn’t engage further on that part. None of them wanted to listen and they had lost interest once they realized I wasn’t a potential 10k fish.
Something something about being the biggest office screen in the southern hemisphere or something. It was really pretty though and it kept changing between sunlit rainforests and watery scapes.
I don't have any major thoughts after this. It was nice visiting the Google Office in real life. Prior to that, I had only read about them in news articles. How sometimes people sleep over in them rather than go home. But it was fine, the article stated. Life at Google was so good (free cereal! free protein bars! how the Insomniac Games offices were modelled after them) so who cares if you can't go back home? There's even private sleeping pods.
"You New Zealanders don't have our good hustle culture," he said. "You have no idea what it means to work!"
A lot of the things they said stuck in my mind. A lot of it reinforced how it was obvious that we grew apart. One of my closest friends told me--in shock--two years back, "Holy shit, you stay in contact with your high school friends? That's so wrong."
He meant, of course, that people became friends out of necessity and proximity. That your chosen friends (and family) happen afterwards--when you have the independence to do so.
I replied saying that while he probably wasn't wrong, it spoke to a certain privilege to think that way. Most people in life are working towards that kind of independence.
If you're not there, then I hope you get there someday.