Hiring Wars in the IT business
If you are thinking of applying to Google, it would be worth reading this piece. A syndicated article by a couple of WSJ journalists casts some light on the need Google, Yahoo, eBay, et al, have to recruit the brightest and the best, and how they go about it. Its not all Google, "Microsoft acknowledges trying to hire some employees from Google and snagged the head of Yahoo Inc.'s research labs earlier this year. Yahoo has aggressively beefed up its research staff with high-profile hires from Amazon.com Inc. and International Business Machines Corp., among others." It also explains how "restricted stock" options work. Though a Yahoo skokesman conceded that it may become harder to compete if Google continues with what he contends are inflated compensation packages.
To accomplish its current pace of hiring about 10 new employees a day, Google has assembled a formidable hiring machine. Its recruitment department includes as many as 300 freelance recruiters who are helping it to identify who's who in software engineering, according to three people involved in the effort.
One top-notch engineer is worth "300 times or more than the average," explains Alan Eustace, a Google vice president of engineering. He says he would rather lose an entire incoming class of engineering graduates than one exceptional technologist. Many Google services, such as Gmail and Google News, were started by a single person, he says.
And an explanation on Google "restricted stock"
Google's Eustace maintains that the salaries it offers for top talent are generally on par with its competitors, or slightly lower. But the offers are often accompanied by hefty grants of restricted stock known as "Google Stock Units." Unlike stock options, which can become worthless if a stock falls below a certain price, restricted stock usually retains value. If employees stay long enough for shares to vest, they receive actual Google shares.