[dsr_]

If the Goog reduced headcount by 50%:

They could not accurately judge productivity, talent or motivation, so some groups would lose their key players. This would demotivate everyone left. They would launch 500-1000 startups with knowledge of how some market of merely a hundred million people is being underserved. A dozen or a hundred of those would become true competitors in those markets.

It would be good for everyone except those who lost health insurance and income at the wrong time, and the Goog itself.

[meepmorp]

> They would launch 500-1000 startups with knowledge of how some market of merely a hundred million people is being underserved. A dozen or a hundred of those would become true competitors in those markets.

So, cut headcount, juice the stock, then have a bunch of possible acquisition targets that have developed viable products in new markets by not being saddled with the intractable corporate inefficiencies you suffer? Sounds like breaking some eggs for a tasty omelette.

I'm only mostly kidding.

[solaarphunk]

Wouldn't it mean that their entire organization is broken, if they can't effectively identify productive and talented people? This seems like a huge problem!

I agree that Google benefits from monopolizing headcount, even if the employees waste their lives doing nothing, because it reduces competition. I would even Google poisons people's work ethic/priorities permanently when they try to leave and go to other startups (this is my personal experience working with former non-technical google employees who only play politics).

[roenxi]

Yes it is a huge problem. No nobody knows how to fix it. This has been the largest and most glaring problem in software for decades now and is not at all a point of confusion for managers.

It is the same question as "how do we measure programmer productivity?" which is similarly a huge problem and, so far, unsolvable.

[_heimdall]

Once a public company gets large enough the stock itself is their product.

It really doesn't matter much what the company produces PR how well it manages its org, they just need to keep producing numbers in a quarterly earning report that few even read so a few clips can make a headline and bolster the stock.

[eru]

You can short Google.

[_heimdall]

Sure, though my point was only that the stock is the product when large enough. Nothing stops you from betting for or against the stock

[eru]

The stock isn't anymore the product than bonds are the product.

[_heimdall]

Sure, though the market cap of a company should be a much higher value than their outstanding bonds

Either way, the primary purpose of the company is to produce paper for financial services