Re: Why I left Google (from original AC to replying AC)
From my experience, Silicon Valley companies are terrific places to work while they're small. People are motivated by the product. Even the product managers spend their time on useful tasks like triaging the thousand things you could do next with the product into a rational list of things to do this week, actively mediating between competing demands and members of staff.
The self-serving layers of management (product or otherwise) don't turn up until much later.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
