There's no greater source of professional resentment than suffering under a manager who's incompetent and a narcissist (my summary of his blurb). After 18 years at Google he probably feels safe burning that bridge.

But why? I could legitimately IMO rag on a handful of former managers who I think mostly meant well but I’m not going to do it in a blog post.

After 18 years at Google he's likely at a stage in his life where he's at f-you money in his bank account.

If he cares more about the company culture than being rehired by the people that disagree with his outlook, why not let it fly? If it instigates a culture change, he wins at the cost of a professional bridge he doesn't value anyway.

One great way to lose the f-you money in your bank account is to get involved in a harassment or slander lawsuit because of some offhand things you said that got pasted all over the interwebs.

I'm not saying that will happen here, but if I were writing this blog post I would have deliberately avoided specifics like this because of that, in part.

It's one thing to legitimately trash Sundar Pichai; another to name some middle-level manager like that.

Zero risk of that. Libel requires proof, and having this go to court would require airing that proof in open court. If this is truthful at all and it only casts shade on one director, and retaliatory suits would be more harmful to the company and illuminating of internal affairs than this blog post. Any competent HR would much rather mediate in private.

The point is, you weren't the person who wrote this. And I'm glad someone did. We need a little more scrutiny on how given people run industry leading ships aground despite making more in a year than some people make their entire lives.

Since when is a VP middle-level management ?

Pretty much half the people who work at any given bank have some sort of "VP" title. "Middle-level" would be overestimating the standing of many with that title.

What a truly arbitrary comment. This is a conversation that is clearly about Google. What possible value did you think you added with what you wrote here.

Bad example, I guess.

You wrote Since when is a VP middle-level management ? in reply to the parent commenter's observation It's one thing to legitimately trash Sundar Pichai; another to name some middle-level manager like that. A VP is very much middle-level management.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_title#Middle_managem...

(a quick look at a Google org chart makes it look like, well, VPs are middle management there too)

I'm not sure what org chart you looked at, but VP's make up less than 0.5% of the company.

To be clear, since I guess we're really drilling down on this: VP denotes senior management at Google? So Hixie's blog post wasn't really dumping on a random middle manager as cmdrporcupine (an ex-Googler, I think) suggested, which was the point of all this, but rather picking on a potential C-suite executive or something?

Yes, VP is senior management at Google. Statistically, middle management is L6 or L7 manager. VP is at least L10.

It's not quite picking on a potential c-suite executive, but it's close. She's two steps away from c-suite, in a company of >180k people.

Thanks for the context. That’s a lot of layers of management you’ve got there.

People who never had the misfortune to work with a truly toxic manager or co-worker are often oblivious to the damage they can cause. I'm speaking of psychological damage, burn out, anxiety, stress, depression, health problems. Naming their abuser can be helpful to people who had to endure such a thing.

> But why? I could legitimately IMO rag on a handful of former managers who I think mostly meant well but I’m not going to do it in a blog post.

Maybe he doesn't think that she mostly meant well?

Good for you. It might save someone from taking a job under what appears to be an awful manager though

But you could.

Well that is because you live your life from a place of fear. Not everyone is like that.

It’s not fear. I just don’t really believe in opening up scabs.

He grew up in Europe, which may have given him different sensibilities.

What is that supposed to mean?

As an European who worked in both North Americans and European companies I can attest European business communication is much more direct and less averse to confrontations.

Having said that, I'm not sure we can assign this difference in mentality to author's decision to name the VP (which I personally find valiant, but probably short-sighted).