Technology Woman: microsoft

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Think Less, Experiment More: 5 Lessons on Entrepreneurship

A guest blog post I wrote for Women Grow Business:

Working for Microsoft, Google and Apple, I not only became a better engineer - I became a better entrepreneur. Their successes and failures, encapsulated in these five lessons, provided me with invaluable instruction in how to build a company and effectively compete.
#1. Build a large network.
The “Biggies,” as I like to call them, have an unfair advantage: they have a network of literally thousands of experts. At Apple, I worked with some of the industry’s best designers. Microsoft has people who specialize in every conceivable role. At Google, I could walk down the hall and speak with the inventors of revolutionary technologies.
To compete with the biggies, you’ll need a network of your own. Get out to those start-up happy hours. Grab business cards. Set up coffee and lunch chats. And be open - you never know who might come in handy.

Keep reading here.

Company Loyalty = using Microsoft search to prep for a new job

Microsoft Loyalty Scorecard:

+ 1: Using Microsoft search at work.
- 1: Using Microsoft search to prepare for your upcoming interviews... at work.

Kumo is Microsoft's new search engine that was released internally this month. No one seems to be talking about it much externally, and it doesn't show up in Google Analytics under "Search Engines". Kumo is, however, listed as a referring site for my site, CareerCup, which helps prepare for technical interviews. Almost all the Kumo users are, of course, from Redmond with a couple in Bellevue and Toyko.

Well, hey - while it's not so nice to look for a new job while at work, at least you're using Microsoft's search engine to get there. Your boss must be thrilled.

But, if you're still looking for a new job, I've got one for you.

Talkinator & The Value of Feedback

I've been using Talkinator, an embeddable chat program for websites, for a few months now.

I realize I might be the only post-1995 site to want a chatroom, but it's actually rather useful. For example, when people are discussing, say, Microsoft Interview Questions, they'll jump in the chatroom to discuss problems. This use was expected.

The more interesting use-case was simply feedback. People hesitate feedback via email, or even through anonymous forms. They will, however, jump in a chatroom and complain. I've discovered a number of bugs this way.

Nifty.

Blue Screens and Web Apps

My laptop, which I fear is on its last legs, got a little servicing today from Dell. It'd been blue screening frequently since, well, since Dell last visited me two months ago (broken fan -> overheating laptop). I'm going to assume that's just a coincidence, although the timing is suspicious...

I tried reinstalling windows first, of course, but then it blue screened when I tried to reinstall. Excellent! At least Dell can't tell me it's a software issue...

I ran some tests and then Dell ran some more tests, to discover that absolutely every test passed. Wonderful! (Paraphasing)

Gayle: "All the tests passed."
Dell: "Ok, well we'll send out a technician to replace the hard drive and the CPU."
Gayle: "Ok, but we ran two separate hard drive tests and they both passed."
Dell: "Sometimes the tests skip over things."
Read: Dell is taking shots in the dark right now. Excellent.

One new hard drive and reinstall later, I'm in the process of getting my computer back up to a liveable state. It's much easier now than it was a year or two ago. There's less to install because of web-based apps, and it's easier to reinstall those few things.

Pictures: I use Picasa. Quick, easy install. Man I love Picasa / Picasaweb - have I mentioned that? More on that another time :-).
Word Processing: Somewhere, amongst piles and piles of CDs, I have the Word and Excel. I think. Google Docs & Spreadsheets works better for most things anyway (since I can access my files from other computers), so I'll hold off on installing Office for now.
Email: I weened myself off Outlook years ago (I used to be a big fan, but then it broke on me) and have been using Gmail for a long time.
Calendar: Google Calendar. Love it!
Web Browsing: Firefox. Installed.
Programming: For non-work things, I use .NET and Visual Studio. I recently moved my two websites (Social/Conduct and CareerCup) over to ASP.NET 2.0, which means that I can just use Visual Studio Express. Good thing too - the regular Visual Studio took sooo long to install.
IM: My friends are split between Google Talk, AIM and Windows Live Messenger.

Google Talk: I do prefer the windows client, so I downloaded that - small, quick, easy.
AIM: While a lot of applications don't significantly improve with each version, AIM was one of the few which actually got worse. Installing was always a hassle because you have to find the appropriately old version of AIM and then match that to the right version of DeadAIM (a plugin that adds some nice features). Gmail Chat now has AIM integration - I think I'll just stick with that.
Windows Live Messenger: Oh my this was hard to install! I download the installer (WLInstaller.exe) and open it. It starts a webpage with my default browser (firefox, of course) and then tells me that I need to use IE 5.0 or greater. Well, damn. Do I really have to change my default browser just to install Windows Live Messenger? Come on now. I eventually track down another site that offers the install file directly.

I'll probably get around to installing Office at some point, and maybe AIM as well. But if I had to pay a few hundred bucks for Office, would I buy it? Probably not. We really are getting increasingly close to the idea of the dummy terminal.

MS Explorer Crashes

Really, name a cruise ship the MS Explorer, and of course it'll crash. Silly people. :-)

A Canadian cruise ship struck submerged ice off Antarctica and began sinking, but all 154 passengers and crew, Americans and Britons among them, took to lifeboats and were plucked to safety by a passing cruise ship.

The Chilean navy said the entire MS Explorer finally slipped beneath the waves Friday evening, about 20 hours after the predawn accident near Antarctica's South Shetland Islands.

No injuries have been reported.

RE: Life at Google - The Microsoftie Perspective

Sigh... why do I always get sucked into these things?

By now, it seems like everyone has read Life at Google - The Microsoftie Perspective. And now, I too am getting sucked into this discussion...

The email pretty much states that one of the primary goals of this article is to give pointers for how Microsoft can convince candidates to come to Microsoft. eg, how can we spin Google's perks the other way? Keep that in mind. These are not necessarily things he does or doesn't like about Google.
People are walking away from this article thinking "oh my god people at Google work really long hours." That's not actually what it says. It actually says that people work 10am - 6pm, but also spend time working from home. 10am - 6pm is an eight hour day - including lunch. Not bad. I work for Google, used to intern at Microsoft, and most of my friends work at Microsoft. I've seen no difference whatsoever in working hours.
"Nearly everyone is on e-mail 24/7". Microsoft employees tend to have SmartPhones with work mail on it, Google employees don't. Also, Google employees tend to use separate accounts for personal and work emails, whereas Microsoft employees tend to use their work address for both (not sure why). So actually, Google employees can more easily stay away from their work email.
"Your [20%] project needs to be tacitly approved by your manager." Heh. That's not true.
"Most managers won't remind you to start a 20% project." That's true. Google has a more hands off management style. They don't babysit you.
"Google doesn't seem to think that private offices are valuable for technical staff. They're wrong." Ah, yes, the often discussed "open office" vs "private office" issue. There are pros and cons for each. The pros for a private office are pretty obvious, so I won't go into them. I think people overlook the pros for an open office: everyone on your team is right there. Have a question about the system architecture? Just ask. Everyone's right there. You don't have to call a meeting. You don't have to run down the hallway. You don't have to make a phone call. It saves a lot of time - and avoids unnecessary meetings.
I actually had my own office for a few weeks when I first started at Google, and after that I shared an office with just one other person. It seemed cool at the time, but now, I actually prefer an open office plans. If I'm getting distracted I can put on my headphones, but normally, it's just nice to have everyone right there. (I've heard that the Bungie team at Microsoft was encouraged to switch to private offices when they were acquired. They declined. I didn't understand why they wanted cubes when I was at Microsoft either. It makes sense now.)
"My manager had over 100 direct reports and is the common case for managers at Google." A slight exaggeration on the reports, but anyway... The email discussion on management only tells one side of the story. You might think, for example, how can a manager with 100 direct reports review you? Well, they don't, your peers do. That's just one example. I guess what I'm saying is that you can't apply Microsoft's management structure (eg, reviews by managers) to Google's numbers (100 direct reports) - that's mixing and matching, and it doesn't work. The structure is very different between the two companies.
"Oh and conflict resolution between team members is very complex." Not complex, just different. Instead of some PM or manager coming down and saying "this is my decision - now go implement!", decisions are made more as a result of team discussion. A manager could step in, but usually a group consensus is better than just one person's decision.
"Of course, if Google handles everything for you, it's hard to think about leaving because of all the "stuff" you'll need to transition and then manage for yourself." Heh. Now you're just being silly!

Is he happier at Microsoft than Google? Why did he leave Google? I'd be curious about those two points which are never addressed.

In my mind, there's one pretty powerful fact in Google's favor: many people have left Microsoft for Google. Microsoft would be more than happy to take them back. If they were happier at Microsoft, don't you think they would return? I don't know anyone who has.

And... I really have to stop getting involved in petty debates :-)

Seattle Times Article: Google vs Microsoft

The front page of the Seattle Times today featured an article on me (and some other people) in reference to employees leaving Microsoft to go to Google. After three internships at Microsoft and a two year stint as a Microsoft campus representative, why didn't I go to Microsoft?

I went to Penn's career fair yesterday representing Google and that seemed to be the popular question there as well. I guess most people just assumed that I'd go back to Microsoft.

So what happened?

It wasn't a clear cut decision. My offers at Microsoft were from Mobile Devices and Windows Media Player, and I was really excited about Mobile Devices. At Google, I didn't know what I would be working on, and I'm not that interested in server-side or web programming.

But, there were lots of little things that made me lean away from Microsoft:

I wanted to do some feature design work, and Google lets developers help drive the product. At Microsoft, while developers can be "in the feedback loop," they're not driving the product - they're just giving occasional feedback. No, it's not the same thing. The PMs at Microsoft do all the design. Yes, there are some group that are very technical (aka, compilers) that are more dev driven, but those aren't groups I'm interested in.

I'd been getting this vibe from people that Microsoft's culture was changing... for the worse

Microsoft, in my experience, seemed to take a "good enough" approach rather than truly driving for excellence. I didn't really recognize this until I went to Apple and I saw the contrast between the two attitudes. Apple really seemed driven towards perfection, where Microsoft would shrug its shoulders and say "eh, good enough." Google's attitude, although I had never worked there, seemed more similar to Apple's.

Microsoft was cutting back on benefits whereas Google seemed to be expanding their benefits. Sure, maybe Google will change, but there's nothing holding me to stay at Google forever if it does.

My last summer at Microsoft just wasn't much fun. I didn't exactly have the best manager, and I just wasn't that into the product I was working on. While that may not have been representative of Microsoft, I can't say that didn't make Microsoft a little less glamorous in my eyes.

Microsoft didn't really seem to work together as a company; instead, it seemed to have a "not my team, not my problem attitude."

How many products are Microsoft do people say are just "awesome?" Not that every product is bad - I'm not one of those people that sits and complains about Windows. But really, how many products are customers really excited about? Xbox, maybe. What else? If your customers aren't excited about what you're doing, will you be?

And finally, let's face it: it's nice not working for the "evil" empire. Microsoft is a monopoly - maybe not in the technical sense of the word (it's debatable), but in the sense of it making it damn tough for anyone to enter the industry because Microsoft can always bundle software. It's nice working for a company that you can really feel good about - and that actively remembers to not be "evil."

So those were all the little things that were going on in my head when I was debating the offers. I guess what it comes down to is that once I spent sometime at Apple, I realized that Microsoft is not as great as it seems.

Meanwhile, Google had these great things about it: the 20% time projects (engineers are encouraged to spend 20% of their time on a different project), free lunch, different locations, etc.

For some reason though, it still wasn't clear cut. I really was seriously considering the Mobile Devices offer. In the end though, I realized that I was simply more excited about Google, and nothing Microsoft could offer me could make up for being excited about your job.

Contest Winners

Well, the Xtreme.NET Challenge was a great success. Here are the winners:

1st: David Siegel, MailAssist

2nd: Wesley & Brandon Rosenblum, KnowtionNet

3rd: Matt Jones, FTP Studio

Finalists:

Jeremy Pfund, Chess Express

Ashfaq Rahman, QI

Chung-tah Tsao, Quattro

David, Matt and Jeremy were my students in cse099 this semester, and Wesley was my student last year. Go ahead, look at the other cse099 projects - some are them are pretty cool (LaTeX chat client, anyone?). I'm so proud of my kiddies :-)

Task.NET Challenge

The Task.NET Challenge has officially opened. This contest is ideally for people new to .NET, but all Penn and Drexel students are invited to enter.
First Prize: 20 GB Zen Portable Media Center

Xtreme.NET Challenge

Prizes for the Xtreme.NET Challenge have been announced:

1st Prize: 20 GB Zen Portable Media Center and an Xbox
2nd Prize: 20 GB Zen Portable Media Center
3rd Prize: 20 GB Zen Portable Media Center

TBA: Finalist Prizes