A former Google employee issued a warning about the company—saying it needs to shift away from a money-focused mindset and focus on consumers.
Key Details
- Former Google employee Praveen Seshadri posted a blog post saying Google has “slowly ceased to function” and the company needs self-awareness.
- Seshadri joined the company in 2020 after it acquired AppSheet, the platform he cofounded. He was with the company until January 2023, saying he stayed with the company for his “three-year mandatory retention period.”
- In his blog post, he states that Google has four core cultural problems…
- No mission.
- No urgency.
- Delusions of exceptionalism.
- Mismanagement.
Why it’s news
For years, Google has been admired as one of the world’s most-admired companies. It expanded into sectors outside search and seemed to succeed in everything that it did.
Google is one of the leading tech companies, but a recent blog post released by a former Google employee states that the company is not doing well mostly because of a lack of self-awareness among both employees and management.
Praveen Seshadri joined Google in 2020 after the company acquired the platform AppSheet that he co-founded. He said he stayed with the company for his “three-year mandatory retention period” but decided to leave mostly due to the company’s problems.
Seshadri states that Google has four core cultural problems. “They are all the natural consequences of having a money-printing machine called ‘Ads’ that has kept growing relentlessly every year, hiding all other sins. (1) no mission, (2) no urgency, (3) delusions of exceptionalism, (4) mismanagement.”
He says the core problems have led employees to only care about pleasing higher-ups who generally have no clear sense of direction for the company, leading to many issues.
He goes on to state that when he worked for a startup, his goal was to do everything for the betterment of the platform to please users, whereas, at Google, they serve managers or other employees rather than serving the user.
He goes on to say for Google to improve, the company needs to commit to a mission to unite the people that work there rather than remaining focused on money.
“Googlers are idealists at heart, and their work needs to mean something,” says Seshadri. “They also need to believe that their executives are pursuing an authentic mission versus just parroting slogans.”