Ryan Peterman · Ryan Peterman · Transcript & summary by WhipScribe
In four minutes a startup CTO explains, with a first-week Google story, why organizations drift toward tolerating people who stop working.
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“It takes a lot of energy to raise a standard. And it takes very little energy to lower it.” Brian Attwell · at 3:04 — open in the transcript →
“There's a lot of smart people in the world. I think it's fairly difficult to have a monopoly on intelligence.” Brian Attwell · at 4:19 — open in the transcript →
Brian Attwell, now CTO of Atoms, traces his skepticism about how big tech is run to his first job at Google. In his opening week he noticed a teammate, whom he calls Frank, doing no work at all. His manager and then his engineering director both waved the concern away on the grounds that Frank was well liked. After repeated complaints Frank was not fired or confronted; he was transferred to a team Attwell describes as building demos for the gift shop, where nobody would object.
Attwell offers two explanations. At large companies the results of the whole business are only loosely tied to the results of any one team, so a manager can choose the comfortable option even when it costs the company. More generally, he argues that lifting a standard takes sustained effort while letting it slip takes almost none, so without pressure expectations slide downward until the company fails or a shock resets them, as he suggests the AI threat has done for DeepMind. He also relays something several Google managers and a VP told him but that he says he cannot prove: roughly a decade ago Google tried to keep smart people on payroll even when idle, so competitors could not hire them.
Ryan Peterman also raises Amazon's reputation for paying strong performers less when their equity has appreciated. Attwell calls that unjust, since equity growth is the employee's own investment return, and says Atoms deliberately avoided the practice early on. His wider view is that processes built around fairness pay off over time, and that hoarding talent makes no sense when no company can corner intelligence.
Brian Attwell is the CTO of Atoms. He began his career at Google, later worked at Amazon, and has spent years thinking about engineering organization design.
Brian Attwell said the main thing Google gave him was a deep-seated skepticism about how well tech companies are run. In his first week he saw a teammate doing no work; his manager and engineering director both excused it because the man was well liked. After Attwell kept complaining, the teammate was moved to a team building demos for the gift shop rather than being fired or confronted.
Brian Attwell said that at large companies the performance of the company is fairly decoupled from the performance of individual teams. That gap makes it easier for managers to do what is convenient for themselves, such as avoiding a hard conversation with a likable underperformer, even when it hurts the company.
Brian Attwell argued that raising a standard takes a lot of energy while lowering it takes very little, because few people complain when asked to do less. With that kind of entropy in a system, he said, standards keep sliding until the company dies or some trauma forces them back up. He pointed to Alphabet treating AI as an existential threat, which he said means the DeepMind team is now working hard.
Brian Attwell said several Google managers and a VP told him that around a decade ago Google had a policy of keeping as many smart people on staff as possible, even if they were no longer working, in case they worked hard again and so competitors could not have them. Attwell stressed he never saw it in writing and cannot prove it existed, and said he knows of no other company that has done the same.
Ryan Peterman raised Amazon's reputation for not rewarding high performers much, partly on the reasoning that their equity had already risen. Brian Attwell called that unjust: equity appreciation is the employee's own investment result and should not factor into future pay decisions. He said companies get away with it because people are mostly happy with the gain, and that Atoms deliberately avoided the practice early on.
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0:00One thing I'm curious about is, and I think companies like Amazon are famous for, you know, not really rewarding the high performers that much. And I was curious to ask you, because you've worked on company design for a while now, or engineering organization design, is like because they can get away with it, right? Like they think, oh, the equity went up by a lot. Maybe it's a little bit unjust to pay you less because your equity went up. I think it's unjust. That's basically your investment. You have got a good investment result. It shouldn't factor into future decisions, but they can get away with doing it because people are mostly happy that it got a lot of appreciation. We actually made a point of not
0:44doing that earlier on. I just think if you design your company processes around being just, it's going to be better for you in the long run, but you kind of just got to believe that. You know, we've been talking a lot about big tech, and I know you started off at Google, and I'm kind of curious, like, you know, what was that like or what did you get from starting at Google? I think the main thing that I got from working at Google is I got like a real deep-seated skepticism for how well tech companies are run. So I joined Google and in my first week, I see there's a guy on my team, doesn't do any work. And let's call him Frank. And I talked to my manager about it. I'm like, what's the deal with Frank, yo?
1:25That's not how I talked, but you get the point. And my boss says, yeah, I know, but he's such a nice guy, Brian. Just lay off. I talked to my engineering director shortly after this, and I say the same thing. He is a little bit embarrassed. Like, he knows that there's something off about having people that don't do work but he repeats the same thing which is that brian this guy's a really great guy and everybody likes him um i actually complained a lot about it and i can't prove anything but he was eventually moved off my team onto a team where no one would complain because no one on the team did any work. The team was just like, they're building demos for the gift shop or something like that.
2:12So what you got from that is that, like that's a Google problem and that he should have been fired. Yeah, absolutely. Or, yeah, he should have been fired or there should have been a serious conversation. Right. And we're like, so you've been here for a while. You've done good work. We're still paying you. Like, could you? Could you do work again? Right. You can't expect us to keep paying you if you don't. And then he might have gotten back into it. Why do you think that that hard conversation wasn't had at Google? I mean, so there is something Google specific that exists there, which I can get back to. But generally at large companies, the performance of the company is fairly decoupled from the performance of individual teams.
2:54So it does become easier for this kind of thing to happen for managers to do things that are convenient for themselves, even if it hurts the company. But there's also this natural thing that happens at companies of any size where it takes a lot of energy to raise a standard. And it takes very little energy to lower it. Few people will complain if you suddenly ask everyone to do less work, which means if you have entropy in a system, standards will naturally fall over time until the company dies. It'll just keep going down until the company dies or until some kind of trauma kicks it back into place, right? Like, if you're at Google right now, the DeepMind team, oh, they're working hard, right? Like,
3:37Google's like, Alphabet's like, oh, there's an existential threat to our existence. The DeepMind team better work hard now. I mean, entrepreneurs will always lower the bar. And there was this thing at Google, which I cannot prove existed, but several managers at Google told me it. So I haven't seen it in writing, but like a VP and some managers told me it existed that around a decade ago, Google had this policy where they wanted to keep as many smart people on staff as possible, even if they weren't working anymore, because maybe they'd work hard again in the future and they didn't want their competitors to have them. So that's just a super unique Google thing. I mean, that's kind of crazy.
4:14I don't know of any other company that's done that. I see. And do you think there's any merit in that kind of hiring strategy? No, because there's a lot of smart people in the world. I think it's fairly difficult to have a monopoly on intelligence.