![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
The Google Experience: and update
Jun. 12th, 2004 09:11 amI'm about 2/3rds of the way into my training period. For those of you keeping track that's a total of six weeks of training, of which I've just finished the first four. We're close to a milestone: we're finished the "core" part of the course and everything from here out is very advanced. My head is spinning with facts, figures, procedures, policies, tips, advice, and some very tricky writing guidelines. As usual, when the subject matter is something I really enjoy, I'm attacking the whole thing with extreme gusto.
It's a thrilling place to be. Even though I don't have to wake up until 8AM to get to work by 9AM, I find myself instead awaking at 6 or 7 in eager anticipation of getting to work. Everybody down there loves going to work. The campus is filled with intelligent, motivated, skilled, young people. We all know how cool a place it is, and we all want to bask in it, live it, and improve it.
Every morning I come into the office and stop by the break room where I pour a bowl of cereal for my breakfast. Nothing is quite as heavenly as munching on a bowl of cereal while I'm starting the day off at my desk. During the day there's cereal, fruit, chips, and every beverage known to humankind available for free for us. Our free lunches are getting to be world famous -- the other day I had kobe beef for the first time. Our gourmet head chef (he used to cook for the Grateful Dead when they were on tour) organizes a squad of culinary experts to prepare Oriental, Mexican, grilled, Italian, salads and more every day, each day a different meal plan with a vast amount of choices.
This isn't quite the atmosphere of a dot-com company spending money like wildfire, however. A friend of mine recently compared Google to a think-tank, like SRI. The atmosphere is there to help focus everyone on enjoying work and alleviating the staff from the concerns of everyday life. Everyone is professional, and everyone is having fun, and that shows through all of our work. It's phenomenally exciting.
I get reviews from my trainers and my boss every week, and so far they tell me they are very happy with my work. They're happy and I'm happy, so I don't see any changes coming. I would be happy to park myself here for a long, long time.
Right now my days primarily consist of taking classes, studying, or applying what I've learned. By applying I mostly mean answering user email, and that does mean I'm already doing so more or less without a safety net. The impact our new group of trainees has had on the team is already apparent: the Online Support Team is humming along at a level of efficiency it's never had before. This is a gratifying feeling for all of us.
That's about all I can think of to give you an overview of my Google experience thus far. I hope it's proven a little insightful.
It's a thrilling place to be. Even though I don't have to wake up until 8AM to get to work by 9AM, I find myself instead awaking at 6 or 7 in eager anticipation of getting to work. Everybody down there loves going to work. The campus is filled with intelligent, motivated, skilled, young people. We all know how cool a place it is, and we all want to bask in it, live it, and improve it.
Every morning I come into the office and stop by the break room where I pour a bowl of cereal for my breakfast. Nothing is quite as heavenly as munching on a bowl of cereal while I'm starting the day off at my desk. During the day there's cereal, fruit, chips, and every beverage known to humankind available for free for us. Our free lunches are getting to be world famous -- the other day I had kobe beef for the first time. Our gourmet head chef (he used to cook for the Grateful Dead when they were on tour) organizes a squad of culinary experts to prepare Oriental, Mexican, grilled, Italian, salads and more every day, each day a different meal plan with a vast amount of choices.
This isn't quite the atmosphere of a dot-com company spending money like wildfire, however. A friend of mine recently compared Google to a think-tank, like SRI. The atmosphere is there to help focus everyone on enjoying work and alleviating the staff from the concerns of everyday life. Everyone is professional, and everyone is having fun, and that shows through all of our work. It's phenomenally exciting.
I get reviews from my trainers and my boss every week, and so far they tell me they are very happy with my work. They're happy and I'm happy, so I don't see any changes coming. I would be happy to park myself here for a long, long time.
Right now my days primarily consist of taking classes, studying, or applying what I've learned. By applying I mostly mean answering user email, and that does mean I'm already doing so more or less without a safety net. The impact our new group of trainees has had on the team is already apparent: the Online Support Team is humming along at a level of efficiency it's never had before. This is a gratifying feeling for all of us.
That's about all I can think of to give you an overview of my Google experience thus far. I hope it's proven a little insightful.
