Google and its reorgs

Just when I felt settled, Google decided to move me from Cloud SWE to GCS SWE (Google Cloud Storage). The transition was bittersweet…

The process to move was mired with mixed feelings. I really admired my new manager and the new org, but I had my destination set elsewhere. I want to talk about what’s happening professionally and what I am doing to accommodate it.

I’ve already talked about my training in Microsoft about Embracing Change. But this time, I needed some extra dose of motivation. I was sort of pushed out of my org into another one. No human can stay motivated after this. For the first time, my optimism dipped to the core. This re-org was not about any tech adoption/deprecation or process improvement, it was about structure, Lol what!! One cannot do anything about re-org obviously, coz the answer to every question is “talk to your manager”. The only good thing was I met many great new people in the GCS org, but that was it.

The weirdness engulfed me, and I found myself constantly complaining about work and feeling disconnected. So, I applied internally to other roles and got into Databases org which is making ecosystem libraries for Gen AI. My decision point was, at least this sounds cool and comes out as closer to AI. Maybe I believed that everyone needs to be an AI engineer soon so better late than never. I was thinking about the levels and expectations as well and it seemed promising. On the surface, it looks optimistic, do work, travel to conferences, seek ideas externally, and spread ideas internally. But ultimately, my career now hinges upon the AI’s growth. Some customers have no idea why they want to do AI, others want god knows what level of intelligence with LLMs. But the sweet spot is with those who understand the space and are struggling with minute details. I hope to help atleast one such company through my work in the new role.

A wise man had once said, when you see a good opportunity, give it your all.

So, net-net I happily went through this re-org with no mixed feelings, because I had to change teams and any country move took a backside. I am putting little to no emphasis on customer engagement, but I do need to fetch feedback from them. So, I am friends with benefits with Database customers. With all the saved time, I am investing it into learning something new every day. Maybe I will need to re-read the book - DBMS.