The Company Will Find You

All companies want to hire the best talent. But how does a company even know if you are looking for a job? What, if like most, you didn’t even apply to a particular company because you felt you weren’t good enough? Even worse, for both you and that company, what if you were wrong in assuming you weren’t good enough?

Max Rosett described Google’s solution to this problem. He stumbled upon it as he was learning computer science via an online program and still lacking the confidence to apply for a full-time software job:
“One morning, while working on a project, I Googled “python lambda function list comprehension.” The familiar blue links appeared, and I started to look for the most relevant one. But then something unusual happened.

The search results split and folded back to reveal a box that said “You’re speaking our language. Up for a challenge?”
Rosett took the challenge and went on to get the job. Google had identified and hired someone based on his queries!

John Gruber commented that:
“Like much of what Google does, this is both incredibly clever and incredibly creepy.”

Incredibly clever? Absolutely. But creepy? Then I remembered that Gruber is an Apple fanboy (In case you’re wondering, Urban Dictionary defines “fanboy” as:
 “A passionate fan of various elements of geek culture (e.g. sci-fi, comics, Star Wars, video games, anime, hobbits, Magic: the Gathering, etc.), but who lets his passion override social graces.”)
A couple of lines later, Gruber proved just that when he wondered:
“It makes me wonder how much Google knows and tracks about queries from programmers at competing companies. Do companies like Apple have policies or recommended practices regarding what employees do with Google services?”
Good luck creating (or enforcing) such policies anywhere. The only way any company can enforce such a policy is by moving to China (where Google is banned)! Ironically, while the iPhone is manufactured in China, Apple goes out of its way to declare that it is “Designed in California”!

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