What next for Google?

After Sergey Solyanik posted his reasons for quitting Google and going back to Microsoft, blogosphere is abuzz with what would/should Google need to do to hire and retain top talent. First lets see the reasons why Sergey was not happy with Google:

1. He talks of silly politics, underperformance, ineffectiveness and inefficiencies - something that most people would readily admit to having witnessed in their own organizations, wherever they are.
2. Orientation towards "cool" rather than "useful"
3. Lack of processes due to #2. Sergey says that becuase "coolness" is the preferred way, it affects the way software is built and the software is driven primarily by engineering- PMs and testers having no meaningful role to play.
4. Google dev manager has no meaningful role to play, though they are very busy and have lot of people reporting into them.

Betsy Schiffman in his column in the Wired magazine gives a list of top notch Googlers that have left and gone elsewhere.

It appears that the #1 challenge of any company would be hiring and retaining the top talent. Turbulence at Google seem to have been noticed by the Fortune magazine too. In this article the author wonders why so many people are leaving Google even though it is making tons of money, full of smart people and a wonderful place to work.

Finally, this ZDNet article lists the following five realities of Google or any other workplace wonderland:

1. Honeymoon doesn't last forever
2. Lack of career development
3. Hiring system that favours a particular type (Google's hiring system is optimized to hire the frest grads that can slog, but may not be suited to established professionals)
4. Mundane work for high achievers
5. Freebies loose their sheen over time

Interesting thoughts. What have you done today to retain your top talent?

Thank you very much,

RamP!