Fired by Google for creating the Google workspace CLI

130 pointsposted 3 hours ago
by justinwp
(twitter.com)

73 Comments

cs702

an hour ago

Looks like a textbook example of Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy.[a]

People like the OP, Justin Poehnelt, who build cool things out of self-motivation that others find interesting and want to use, are now at the mercy of those inside Google who care more about the company's internal bureaucracy and their own role and importance within it. To them, the fact that the OP's project was an instant github hit meant nothing.

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EDIT: Others here are saying that Justin released his code with Google's branding without asking for approval. If that's true, it wasn't right of him, and his firing was justifiable. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48650310 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48650192

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[a] https://jerrypournelle.com/reports/jerryp/iron.html

xnx

an hour ago

Google is worth $4+ TRILLION. There is natural and needed bureaucracy in preserving that. This type of probably well-meaning, but cowboy activity is not worth the risk to Google.

jauco

an hour ago

You’re not disagreeing with gp.

I like the law because you can quite easily formulate it without bias.

Large enough orgs will indeed get people whose job is more closely aligned with the goal vs people whose job is more closely aligned with the existence of the org. _Because_ you need to keep investing energy to keep the org in existence. You can’t just do the goal only.

But being responsible for keeping the org in existence is not the same as responsible for the goals that the org was created for in the first place.

_and_ I can see how the people whose job it is to ensure the org keeps existing will gain the majority vote.

It’s like a law of nature: the way things fall out if you’re not consciously working to have them fall out differently.

(So it can be good for google to fire them from a “let’s keep existing standpoint” even though it might be contrary to having the easiest/optimal to use product. And if that is so, the keep existing vote will have the power) I don’t use google products really that much so I can’t speak to the merits of this example.

judge2020

an hour ago

Unlikely that the bureaucracy is what will keep them valuable in the long-term.

worik

an hour ago

Yes, very true

But in the long term, we are all dead

josefritzishere

14 minutes ago

How long is has a different answer for everyone.

BrenBarn

an hour ago

Actually it means less than nothing, it's a negative, because it shows that working outside the system can be popular and potentially woo away users, which challenges the supremacy of the organization.

logicchains

an hour ago

People ask why Google's Gemini is falling behind the competition in spite of Google's immense resources, this kind of thing is an example why.

FuriouslyAdrift

an hour ago

the Antigravity AI suite is hugely popular among non-developers

throwaway23597

an hour ago

Who is in charge of naming things at Google? Like a five syllable word followed by "AI", I couldn't think of a worse name for a product competing for mind share.

stogot

an hour ago

So is every other AI tool

xnx

an hour ago

Yikes. The lack of judgement involved in personally releasing something that could be confused for an official release (I was confused) by your employer is someone who has huge wildcard risk in the future. I would expect significant disciplinary action if they didn't follow procedure, and termination if they were directly warned at any point.

ktm5j

an hour ago

Yeah that's kind of the impression that I had.. should have ran it past his superiors. Hope he learns something from this instead of deflecting like he seems to be doing.

ingvay7

29 minutes ago

Particularly for a company that possibly has to navigate high-volume, often frivolous litigation and brand attacks from trolls. I have been in similar situations having to partner with legal defending the most frivolous things on products released. You literally sign docs to not do such things when u onboard. Not sure what the point of broadcasting this is though.

busterarm

5 minutes ago

Not only that but not clearing with your management that you're not working on something that is actually being worked on as a product.

Definitely they put some manager and/or team in a very uncomfortable position releasing this.

jbm

an hour ago

Your ships would have been sunk during the 2002 Millennial challenge and an entire bureaucracy would defend you for the next 20 years.

echoangle

an hour ago

Interesting that people here seem so sympathetic to the fired guy. Wouldn’t you kind of expect to be fired if you release a project under your employers name that’s not even associated with them and hasn’t been cleared? Working for them actually makes it worse because people could look up your name and would see that you actually work for google. It’s kind of obvious that this is a bad idea, right?

throwaway23597

an hour ago

I tend to agree with you here. This is the equivalent of that scene in Better Call Saul where Jimmy makes a commercial without getting sign-off from the partners. It doesn't matter whether the thing worked - this is essentially a mutiny from the product roadmap.

nickv

2 hours ago

Yikes. I see Justin posted this, and I'm sure he can't say much - but this is an absolutely insane story.

Google has gone from encouraging 20% time (to create amazing projects like this) to firing people for doing it.

There seems to be some true maliciousness going on at Google. You have this, you have the open source Gemini CLI getting replaced with a shittier closed source Antigravity CLI, etc... etc... What is going on there?

dmazzoni

an hour ago

When has 20% projects ever been about bypassing every launch process and just posting your product publicly?

Google may be a big bureaucracy now, but launch approvals and processes are there for a reason.

notfromhere

2 hours ago

its what happens when a company runs out of ideas and is mostly run by people with MBAs.

Good ideas are now risky because it steps on the toes of someone's fiefdom

lokar

2 hours ago

There have always been lots of ideas. The issue is the management consultants and finance took over.

ex-aws-dude

an hour ago

Maybe the policy is that you can’t just release 20% time projects publically?

nomel

an hour ago

I've never worked for an employer, from pizza delivery, to corporate intern, to multiple startup, to FAANG, that didn't have this VERY CLEARLY worded in the employment agreement, right up top:

1. Any work you do during company time/resources/equipment, is company property.

2. Anything public related to work, or that could be considered as competing or providing the service in the same space as work, needs to be vetted by the company.

Along with public communication, etc.

In my experience, this isn't some "what happens when MBA's run company" or "they run out of ideas", it's literally every company I've ever worked for.

Was google previously an exception here, or are people just unfamiliar with the details of the 20% policy? Surely they didn't allow you to work on, for example, something for a competitor? There had to be some limitations, rather than a pure free for all, as seems to be suggested in the comments.

justinwp

3 hours ago

I am not going to share much more than what I already have, but I think this speaks to the experience of working in big tech and the disruption caused by AI both at the level of teams/roadmaps/incentives and changing user behavior.

anon84873628

2 hours ago

It would help if you clarify whether you followed the OSS release process guidelines, which are very clearly documented.

"Fired for making a thing" is different from "fired for not following the rules".

justinwp

an hour ago

To clarify, I was on the Google Workspace Developer Relations team, the majority of my work was that exact OSS release process. It is not clearly documented and always changing. You can read some of it here, https://opensource.google/documentation/reference/releasing/..., but like I said it is always changing. Relevant: https://www.theregister.com/software/2023/01/27/what-is-goog...

dekhn

an hour ago

Something in the explanation is missing here. It's still not clear to me from any of the provided context whether you got approval to release this. At least from my understanding of your role, if you had approval and used an official google repository, you would not get fired for merely publishing code that accesses a documented API through documented endpoints.

Hence many people are wondering if you released this without approval (that's my guess), if you used a Google repo to do it (from what I can tell you did use a google repo, but not an officially supported one, and other teams at google use this repo to publish code), and whether there were other extenuating circumstances, or if it was "the workspace SVP called my division's VP and told him to fire me" (just a guess for another firing mechanism).

computerdork

23 minutes ago

...By the way, on a different subject, 4 days ago, had read your comments on a different post dealing with Alzheimer's. Just now, asked you a follow up question, and it's easy for them to get buried in your hackernews comments threads, so thought I'd just mention it. Thanks!

anon84873628

11 minutes ago

Straight from that page:

>This includes side projects that have not gone through IARC, even for DevRel engineers.

So did you do this "Launcher2" or "Ariane" thing and get the approvals? If so, it seems your ass would be covered. If not...

I can sympathize that the process seems convoluted and could particularly bite a DevRel accustomed to more autonomy. One would hope Google would do the whole blame free retrospective thing and improve the systems.

Ferret7446

43 minutes ago

The OSS release process has always stated that you can't use Google branding for a unilateral launch. You aren't making yourself look better

alberth

2 hours ago

Sorry to hear your story.

Since I’ve never work at FAANG, does Google have strict procedures (and approvals) before launching a product? And if so, did this go through that process?

jkaplowitz

2 hours ago

> does Google have strict procedures (and approvals) before launching a product?

I worked at Google in the past, most recently ending in early 2015, and can confirm that the answer to this question was yes when I was there - presumably still the case today with different details.

I have no idea whether the procedures were followed in this case, nor do I have any other inside information on this story, nor am I speaking for Google or Alphabet here.

trollbridge

an hour ago

It was certainly the case for me back circa... I can barely remember, 2008/2009?

Everyone just launched tools internally, although it was pretty easy to get approval to launch something externally, although most people didn't bother. The environment back then had tons of internal tools all over the place.

lokar

2 hours ago

I’ve been gone a few years, but there was a process for contributing OSS code outside the company, and another for releasing company code externally, etc

It seemed to mostly work. Some people complained it was too slow, others seemed to manage fine.

I think Chris DiBonas’ team ran all of that.

freedomben

an hour ago

Really sorry to hear about this. It's so ironic because your tool is something that made G workspace so much more useful to me personally and was a deciding factor in which calendar project I used. Getting fired for making a product more useful to customers is quite ironic.

Thank you for your work on the tool! Paired with a claude skill I wrote around it, it saves me a ton of time creating a logseq meeting note page for important meetings.

I wish you the best of luck landing somewhere that appreciates you a lot more than G did.

fragmede

2 hours ago

I haven't been following along with your story closely so forgive me for asking you to repeat things that you've probably already said, but did they just fire you out of the blue or did they talk to you and it didn't go well?

827a

an hour ago

IMO: If the project leverages Google branding or authority improperly, then it shouldn't be on github and should not be under active development by Google employees; yet it is. If Google is suddenly alright with the way the project leveraged Google branding and authority, then the cause for firing the original developer, especially given Google's famously lax stance toward 20% projects and internal open source, is a lot weaker. In other words: Healthy companies do not fire individuals simply for breaching branding guidelines in a way that is ultimately beneficial and looked favorably upon by the company. That's literally just not a thing that happens; at worst you get a reprimand, and in many healthy companies you'd actually get a promotion.

So, something does not add up. It might be the story of the person fired. It might also be on the other side; that our external impression on what's been going on inside of Google needs to be re-adjusted, and this company will be a lot weaker in ten years than I would have originally estimated.

arjie

2 hours ago

The concerns seem to be primarily around trademark and logos? Unless there's more to it, those seem trivial to remedy by requiring removal of logos and renaming in the style of Clawdbot -> Moltbot -> OpenClaw. Google is well-known to be pretty sparing with firing people even for performance, so either this is a change in stance (entirely possible) or there's more to it.

cynicalkane

2 hours ago

For over the last >1 year, Google has been dismissing people without warning or cause. The days where it was nearly impossible to be fired are over; now you might be severed by surprise for no given reason at all.

collabs

an hour ago

Anecdotally speaking, I have seen a change in behavior even from early 2024. I was in a meeting (online) with a few people from Google shortly before Google IO about something fairly small. The technical engineer actually spoke(!) and he talked about revenue and stuff. I was dumbfounded that technical engineers at Google would ever care about "moving the needle".

stogot

an hour ago

Are you sure it wasn’t a “customer engineer” role?

lern_too_spel

an hour ago

I know many people at Google who have been waiting to get laid off to get better terms than they would from just quitting. Now they know what to do.

tonfa

an hour ago

People don't typically get a nice severance package if they're fired for violating company policy.

(edit: not saying that was the case here, working on devrel usually makes it part of your job to publish code)

trollbridge

an hour ago

Firings like this often include a technically voluntary separation agreement that gives you a few extra weeks' pay or some additional months of health benefits etc. precisely to avoid that problem. (Also gets them out of paying unemployment, and means they can get a fresh set of NDAs/nondisparagement etc. signed with the employee.)

I would never fire an employee unilaterally, especially over something like this, when there's valuable IP at stake and you can just talk the person into agreeing to sign over whatever it is you need.

manwithopinions

2 hours ago

I think that’s a good instinct but this line…

“I think the cause was that Workspace and certain leaders (and projects) were afraid of being disrupted.”

Suggests that there is much more to it. I suspect it’s actually about disregarding Google’s internal processes (which is forgivable) and then demanding to work unilaterally (unforgivable). The amount of positive feedback may have given the author too much confidence that he could dictate to leadership what comes next.

A Google Workspace CLI is a useful project idea but it isn’t groundbreaking, it’s something that the Google Workspace team should be involved in. I suspect he just wanted go steamroll over them. Shipping stuff in a team is never about just producing the code.

danielodievich

an hour ago

5 years ago out of necessity I made a CLI around a private product API to manage something it wasn't making publicly, by reverse-engineering the API and complex logons and etc. It was very useful to ~ 100 people worldwide but it was enough of an audience. But I couldn't get any traction releasing it publicly until a distinguished engineer very far away from my org was in need of just this tool for his project. All of a sudden I got an innovation award from company leadership and legal fast tracked open-sourcing it. Pushing something like this out into public repo without legal review is suicidal.

firefax

2 hours ago

So... they fired him for doing a 20% time project? I'm glad I don't have any of their stock to sell, what terrible management.

outside1234

an hour ago

20% time project != able to just launch it YOLO style

I suspect the core issue here is that he launched it with Google logos without following any sort of process

sourdecor

an hour ago

Yeah, endorsement matters. It can represent the whole. You have to be careful with it.

ex-aws-dude

an hour ago

That would be dumb but I don’t think it should result in firing still

free652

an hour ago

2 months later, I think we can assume some kind of process behind that didnt go well for our friend here.

dolmen

41 minutes ago

It looks like he wants his former manager to be fired too. This only gives bad signals to hiring teams.

Ferret7446

41 minutes ago

I'd guess he was fired for refusing to comply after legal talked with him

stevenalowe

40 minutes ago

Do not use the brand without permission is taught on Day 1. Who can give you permission, not so much.

speak_plainly

an hour ago

Google seems to be filled with really talented people, technology, and every resource anyone would ever need, but their execution and management seems to be severely lacking. This account is a pretty damning indictment of Google.

Look at the entire Bard-to-Gemini launch, and from my experience, Gemini's performance is slipping hard recently. Then you have the sheer scale of the Google graveyard. And finally, take a look at Youtube lately.

The company increasingly feels optimized for internal politics and corporate metrics rather than building the best possible products for real people. I guess this is why monopolies suck.

OJFord

2 hours ago

I don't get it – you called the GitHub org 'googleworkspace' and used the Google logo? Presumably without permission? Don't Googlers regularly open-source side projects under the official org(s)? Did you really think this was going to be fine, or was it 'growth hacking' with tougher consequences than expected?

dekhn

2 hours ago

I believe it's an official or semi-official Google github org. Typically at Google there is some process you are supposed to follow when opensourcing your code, and a repo like this exists specifically to get more people to use the API. The CLI still exists at the repo and the repo still has the Google branding, so it's 99% certain this is a Google repo.

If you do an end-run around the normal open source publishing you can get in trouble- up to and including termination- but my guess is there is more context around the firing than just "posted open source code to work with standard Google APIs". For example, you can get punished at google (up to and including termination) for raising your voice in a meeting.

OJFord

an hour ago

Ah ok, that makes a lot more sense. Makes it a lot less clear why he was fired, but his side as told makes more sense at least!

fragmede

2 hours ago

Yes, berating a coworker for being a fucking moron is unacceptable in corporate America.

hilariously

2 hours ago

The truth is that in decent workplaces we've figured out attacking people doesn't generally get what you want, unless what you want is to have a tantrum.

Calling an idea nonsense is fine, calling it not profitable is great, and saying its a waste of time is a Monday. Attacking someone as a fucking moron is pointless, just fire them, deprioritize them, or move on.

xendo

an hour ago

Around that time I built a CLI to access and manage monitoring cameras that my company is selling. After giving a demo to my leadership I strongly adviced against releasing it to public. Giving agents access to some stuff is bad for customers.

websap

2 hours ago

This is what happens when companies are run by boomers who care more about building their orgs, instead of doing hard cutting edge engineering work.

Sucks for the author. Hope they land a good gig at a frontier lab.

shevy-java

2 hours ago

> getting grilled by legal about why the Google logo and brand colors are on the Google Workspace GitHub code repositories.

> I think the cause was that Workspace and certain leaders (and projects) were afraid of being disrupted.

I normally don't defend Google - this pure Evil should not exist. Degoogling is a holy act. But it is also kind of silly to create a project, attach Google logo etc... to it while working at Google. Or perhaps it was a genius move. Either way I am not entirely certain whether the description is as clear here. If it was an internal tool only, did it need a logo? If it was external, who would use it when a Google logo is attached? That's all very strange to me.

> But the fear wasn't specific to my CLI, it was a broader fear in what agents meant for Workspace.

That may be the case - Google lies to humans all the time. See when they killed ublock origin via fake "arguments" that were lies (killed it in the sense that the Google store crippled it: https://chromewebstore.google.com/search/ublock%20origin?hl=... - I just tried to find the old webpage on chrome webstore but the search results no longer show it, only alternative names that are fake projects. I should have bookmarked the old link, Google is REALLY so annoying. The world wide web needs to overcome its number #1 enemy here. Which is Google.)

jasonlotito

2 hours ago

> But it is also kind of silly to create a project, attach Google logo etc... to it while working at Google.

Nah. Fuck Google. Reasonable humans would talk to him, fix it, and move on. They don't need you carrying an ounce of water.

trollbridge

an hour ago

Yeah, the reasonable thing here is a stern talking-to about company policies, and then leveraging this thing to get more goodwill in the community about AI, which is an area Google is currently lacking in.

Ferret7446

37 minutes ago

He probably got that talking to, and continued to be stubborn and unapologetic. Getting fired is quite difficult, as there will be multiple attempts at resolving any issue.