tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post116396918844778859..comments2024-03-18T12:52:48.117-07:00Comments on Mini-Microsoft: A Peanut Butter Manifesto for Microsoft to Chew OnWho da'Punkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18205453956191063442noreply@blogger.comBlogger71125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-63005753469753758822008-12-02T00:14:00.000-08:002008-12-02T00:14:00.000-08:00Thanks for a great post. I was hired as an L63 and...Thanks for a great post. I was hired as an L63 and am working towards L64. The path spelled out for me is difficult but achievable. It would be really useful to have a follow-up on the L65 "knife fight".Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1165289034710609152006-12-04T19:23:00.000-08:002006-12-04T19:23:00.000-08:00FWIW - Lisa Brummel exercised options worth just o...<I>FWIW - Lisa Brummel exercised options worth just over $5.25 million in the last month. From what I've seen of her I like her and can really begrudge her good fortune but I imagine that there are more than few Microsoft employees who were hired post options days or who have older options that are under water who would see that news as disheartening. This information is publicly available.</I><BR/><BR/>Update, 10 Million. 5 mil on 11/13 and another 5 mill on 11/16. Guess someone needed a little xmass spending cash.<BR/><BR/>http://finance.yahoo.com/q/it?s=MSFTAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1165202194158810882006-12-03T19:16:00.000-08:002006-12-03T19:16:00.000-08:00100 VPs? Ha! You haven't been out to PressPass rec...<I>100 VPs? Ha! You haven't been out to PressPass recently.<BR/><BR/>Total execs: 124</I><BR/><BR/>As someone pointed out, this list doesn't include the Technical Fellows (14). It also doesn't include the DEs, who are partner level if not VP level (32). It also doesn't include 25-50 "plain VPs" as the list on Press Pass is only Corporate VP and above.<BR/><BR/>So, we likely have 175-200 VP level employees at a minimum.<BR/><BR/>It would be interesting to see the count of employees by level. You think LisaB would post that here for us? :-)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1165000686103757052006-12-01T11:18:00.000-08:002006-12-01T11:18:00.000-08:00FWIW - Lisa Brummel exercised options worth just o...FWIW - Lisa Brummel exercised options worth just over $5.25 million in the last month. From what I've seen of her I like her and can really begrudge her good fortune but I imagine that there are more than few Microsoft employees who were hired post options days or who have older options that are under water who would see that news as disheartening. This information is publicly available.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164780860718482632006-11-28T22:14:00.000-08:002006-11-28T22:14:00.000-08:00I am a consultant for a European company, working ...<I>I am a consultant for a European company, working with them on a MS IPTV project.<BR/></I><BR/><BR/>Is MSTV still alive? Are they still split up between Redmond and Mountain View? There were a few smart folks there and a lot of not so smart folks. Another group that could use some real technical guidance, more careful hiring, and less political BS. I couldn't believe how many ship-its I got for products that were never seen by customers (and the one they did see to their regret).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164645109371525822006-11-27T08:31:00.000-08:002006-11-27T08:31:00.000-08:00>> It might be relevant if Vista didn't in >> fact...>> It might be relevant if Vista didn't in <BR/>>> fact implement the very solution that Joel is whining about<BR/><BR/>I'm sorry, but you're talking out of your ass. Vista's "power" button contrary to the icon on it activates _sleep_ mode. And it's not Mac's "safe sleep" which is sleep+hibernate. It's regular Windowss "dumb" sleep without dumping memory to the hard drive. Which means that if there's a power outage or your laptop battery goes out, you're SOL.<BR/><BR/>So smart users will have to always use flyout, or re-assign the power button in the Start menu to do a proper shutdown or painfully slow hibernate. To do this you need to wade through several levels of dialogs, though, so most users will either suffer the flyout or suffer data loss due to unsafe sleep.<BR/><BR/>That's design by a committee for you, pal.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164613989924614952006-11-26T23:53:00.000-08:002006-11-26T23:53:00.000-08:00> "Total execs: 124"This list doesn't contain tech...> "Total execs: 124"<BR/><BR/>This list doesn't contain technical fellows, who are individual contributors on VP level and their compensation and responsibilities are on level with other VPs (for example, Dave Cutler, Mark Russinovich...)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164590851199632982006-11-26T17:27:00.000-08:002006-11-26T17:27:00.000-08:00100 VPs? Ha! You haven't been out to PressPass rec...100 VPs? Ha! You haven't been out to PressPass recently. For reference:<BR/><BR/>Alain Crozier <BR/>Alain Peracca <BR/>Alexander Gounares <BR/>Allison Watson <BR/>Amir Majidimehr <BR/>Amitabh Srivastava <BR/>Andrew Lees <BR/>Anoop Gupta <BR/>Antoine Leblond <BR/>Ben Fathi <BR/>Bernard Vergnes <BR/>Bill Gates <BR/>Bill Mitchell <BR/>Bill Veghte <BR/>Blair Westlake <BR/>Blake Irving <BR/>Bob Muglia <BR/>Brad Smith <BR/>Brent Callinicos <BR/>Brian Arbogast <BR/>Bruce Jaffe <BR/>Bryan Lee <BR/>Chris Capossela <BR/>Chris Jones <BR/>Christopher Liddell <BR/>Christopher Payne <BR/>Craig Mundie <BR/>Daniel T. Ling <BR/>Dan'l Lewin <BR/>Darren Huston <BR/>David Cole <BR/>David Thompson <BR/>David Treadwell <BR/>David Vaskevitch <BR/>Debra Chrapaty <BR/>Doug Burgum <BR/>Eduardo Rosini <BR/>Enrique Rodriguez <BR/>Eric Rudder <BR/>Frank H. Brod <BR/>G. Michael Sievert <BR/>George Zinn <BR/>Gerri Elliott <BR/>Grant George <BR/>Gurdeep Singh Pall <BR/>Henry P. Vigil <BR/>J Allard <BR/>Jane Boulware <BR/>Jawad Khaki <BR/>Jeanne Sheldon <BR/>Jean-Philippe Courtois <BR/>Jeff Bell <BR/>Jeff Raikes <BR/>Jeff Teper <BR/>Jens Winther Moberg <BR/>Jim Allchin <BR/>Jim Minervino <BR/>Joanne K. Bradford <BR/>Joe Belfiore <BR/>Joe Peterson <BR/>Jon DeVaan <BR/>Julie Larson-Green <BR/>Kathleen Hogan <BR/>Kevin Johnson <BR/>Kevin Turner <BR/>Kirill Tatarinov <BR/>Kurt DelBene <BR/>Lewis Levin <BR/>Lindsay Sparks <BR/>Lisa Brummel <BR/>Maria Martinez <BR/>Marshall Phelps <BR/>Mary E. Snapp <BR/>Mich Mathews <BR/>Michael Delman <BR/>Michael Park <BR/>Mike Nash <BR/>Mindy Mount <BR/>Mitchell L. Koch <BR/>Moshe Lichtman <BR/>Neil Holloway <BR/>Orlando Ayala <BR/>Paul Flessner <BR/>Peter Klein <BR/>Peter Moore <BR/>Peter Neupert <BR/>Peter Pathe <BR/>Pieter Knook <BR/>Rajesh Jha <BR/>Ray Ozzie <BR/>Richard McAniff <BR/>Rick Devenuti <BR/>Rick Rashid <BR/>Rick Thompson <BR/>Robert J. Bach <BR/>Robert Short <BR/>Ron Markezich <BR/>S. Somasegar <BR/>Sanjay Parthasarathy <BR/>Satya Nadella <BR/>Scott Di Valerio <BR/>Shane Kim <BR/>Simon Witts <BR/>Steve Ballmer <BR/>Steve Berkowitz <BR/>Steve Liffick <BR/>Steve Schiro <BR/>Steven Sinofsky <BR/>Stuart L. Scott <BR/>Suzan DelBene <BR/>Tami Reller <BR/>Tanya Clemons <BR/>Ted Kummert <BR/>Timothy Chen <BR/>Todd Holmdahl <BR/>Todd Warren <BR/>Tom Burt <BR/>Tom Button <BR/>Tom Gibbons <BR/>Tony Hey <BR/>Umberto Paolucci <BR/>Will Poole <BR/>Ya-Qin Zhang <BR/>Yusuf Mehdi <BR/>Total execs: 124 <BR/>This is down a couple over the last few months...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164589515905000572006-11-26T17:05:00.000-08:002006-11-26T17:05:00.000-08:00I think this is relevant:http://joelonsoftware.com...<I>I think this is relevant:<BR/><BR/>http://joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/11/24.html</I><BR/><BR/>It might be relevant if Vista didn't in fact implement the very solution that Joel is whining about (plus an advanced flyout which normal users need never click on). But when it comes to UI everyone thinks he's a master chef.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164586317950035902006-11-26T16:11:00.000-08:002006-11-26T16:11:00.000-08:00See Moishe Lettvin's blog "The Windows Shutdown cr...See Moishe Lettvin's blog "The Windows Shutdown crapfest".<BR/><BR/>Here's what Joel Spolsky had to say:<BR/><BR/>"How many Microsofties does it take to implement the Off menu?<BR/>This item ran on the Joel on Software homepage on Friday, November 24, 2006<BR/>Moishe Lettvin, who spent a year working on the menu I criticized yesterday: “So that nets us a conservative estimate of 24 people involved in this feature.”<BR/><BR/>Every piece of evidence I've heard from developers inside Microsoft supports my theory that the company has become completely tangled up in bureaucracy, layers of management, meetings ad infinitum, and overstaffing. The only way Microsoft has managed to hire so many people has been by lowering their hiring standards significantly. In the early nineties Microsoft looked at IBM, especially the bloated OS/2 team, as a case study of what not to do; somehow in the fifteen year period from 1991 - 2006 they became the bloated monster that takes five years to ship an incoherent upgrade to their flagship product."Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164582733523184382006-11-26T15:12:00.000-08:002006-11-26T15:12:00.000-08:00Business Week's "The Soul of a New Microsoft" sugg...Business Week's "The Soul of a New Microsoft" suggests that J "how many billion in the red?" Allard will save the company. http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_49/b4012001.htm<BR/><BR/>This quote really jumped out and bit me, though: "<I>Allard is one of more than 100 Microsoft vice-presidents</I>"<BR/><BR/><B>We have more than 100 vice presidents?</B>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164578779212199412006-11-26T14:06:00.000-08:002006-11-26T14:06:00.000-08:00Enjoy:http://www.drizzle.com/~lettvin/2006/11/wind...Enjoy:<BR/><BR/>http://www.drizzle.com/~lettvin/2006/11/windows-shutdown-crapfest.html<BR/><BR/>:)Diegohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18081775339476161685noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164578111807921332006-11-26T13:55:00.000-08:002006-11-26T13:55:00.000-08:00Great post Mini and very timely as well. It's lat...Great post Mini and very timely as well. It's late November and that means bring out the hip boots to wade into that fun time of year known as Mid-Year Review or Strategy Review depending on what org you're in. The peanut butter post and a few other things in my day job made me think... Do we have a strategy?? I asked some people for their opinion and got one of a few answers:<BR/><BR/>- Sell more NOW.<BR/>- Just f'in ship it.<BR/>- Some goal related to their organization's commitments.<BR/><BR/>So no, we don't have a cohesive strategy. I believe this is one reason we hired Ray Ozzie - to sort out the technical melange of things we could do as a compoany to the shorter list of things we should do and then to the focused list of things we must do. Ray's background makes him a reasonable choice and I'd rather have him at MSFT than at one of our competitors. <BR/><BR/>But that's just the technical side of the equation. What about the business models? How will we take this great stuff we're developing and make it widely profitable as a business? That's the strategy we're lacking and why we're falling behind in the market as a result. I've yet to meet a true business person at MSFT (in my opinion that is) who would be worth their weight in salt on the business model topic. It's a shame because we could really set the pace there, but we choose not to. <BR/><BR/>A different kind of geek develops business models - geeks with statistical, finance and marketing backgrounds who unfortunately are in short supply at MSFT and the few that are around don't get the kudos in the review system. We are great at tactical, one-off stuff in these functions which garners kudos galore in review models because of our cultural fascination with the "hero syndrome". But this isn't a short term tacktical game any more and we're truly awful at the long term game. <BR/><BR/>Frankly I'm at a loss at the moment for how to fix this. It starts at the top and if our most senior folks don't get this then perhaps this is pointless. The problem is many of them have done the ride and reaped the benefit of huge payouts - good for them, personally I think that's great - but don't confuse success in the past with the ability to generate success in the future. MSFT needs a new breed of leadership that can balance technical and business advancement equally well and THAT is what can give us a long term competitive edge.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164564553378860602006-11-26T10:09:00.000-08:002006-11-26T10:09:00.000-08:00RE: "Your level coming in depends a lot on the gro...RE: "Your level coming in depends a lot on the group you interview with"<BR/><BR/>For six years I've contributed to projects that generate more than 3 billion per quarter.<BR/><BR/>So this means that MSFT values a kid working on a toy project that will never ship higher than me?<BR/><BR/>No wonder its the ICs which move and not the stock.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164541824629552072006-11-26T03:50:00.000-08:002006-11-26T03:50:00.000-08:00Happy Thanksgiving everyone.Yahoo! has adopted Mic...Happy Thanksgiving everyone.<BR/><BR/><I>Yahoo! has adopted Microsoft style stack ranking. Oh wait - this is prescribed by a consultant.<BR/><BR/>The new system at Microsoft is also done by a consultant. The same one that advises Yahoo!</I><BR/><BR/>this truth? Interesting...<BR/><A HREF="http://azazelo.info/" REL="nofollow">Azazelo Blog</A>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164527334982944542006-11-25T23:48:00.000-08:002006-11-25T23:48:00.000-08:00I think this is relevant:http://joelonsoftware.com...I think this is relevant:<BR/><BR/>http://joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/11/24.htmlAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164503737330880872006-11-25T17:15:00.000-08:002006-11-25T17:15:00.000-08:00Peanut butter.I am a consultant for a European com...Peanut butter.<BR/><BR/>I am a consultant for a European company, working with them on a MS IPTV project.<BR/><BR/>The MS TV people exhibit the worst of the new Microsoft. <BR/><BR/>Understaffed. <BR/>Underpaid. <BR/>Unable to hire new people because of crappy salaries. (Some of the job postings are more than a year old)<BR/>People bailing to Google, leaving yet more endless 70 hour weeks for the survivors.<BR/>Farther and farther behind schedule.<BR/>Death Spiral?<BR/><BR/>Locked into the classic MS development model that worked 10 years ago but seems to fail in recent times. <BR/><BR/>Combined with that MS arrogance that they understand the needs of their customers better than their customers do.<BR/><BR/>Any wonder that the Telcos can't make IPTV work?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164501187228544772006-11-25T16:33:00.000-08:002006-11-25T16:33:00.000-08:00If you come from a good college (Waterloo) with ex...<I>If you come from a good college (Waterloo) with excellent grades, you can get hired at 62. Go me!</I><BR/><BR/>How many Canadians work at this company, anyways? Every time I turn around, another Canadian... (not that there's anything wrong with that)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164485395179377832006-11-25T12:09:00.000-08:002006-11-25T12:09:00.000-08:00Your level coming in depends a lot on the group yo...Your level coming in depends a lot on the group you interview with. Anecdotal evidence is that the legacy groups are likely to level at 59/60 while the emerging groups are a lot looser with levels.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164473585350365402006-11-25T08:53:00.000-08:002006-11-25T08:53:00.000-08:00Its not just college hires that come in as 59/60. ...Its not just college hires that come in as 59/60. Plenty of people with 2 or maybe even more years of experience come in at that level. It's not about experience, its about the amount of experience that 'shows' during the interview. Of course, its also about who interviews you. Most product teams don't know how to interview or even identity people with skill sets beyond level 63. So they'll end up evaluating you on your skills that are most relavent for these lower levels. Half the time we do hire someone in at level 65 or above, its a mistake. (I'm talking about product development here, not upper management, though maybe they have this problem too.) Most likely you would get hired in at these higher levels if you were a well known somebody at a company with a well known product, or a well known researcher or student with well known work.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164444582331546252006-11-25T00:49:00.000-08:002006-11-25T00:49:00.000-08:00If you come from a good college (Waterloo) with ex...If you come from a good college (Waterloo) with excellent grades, you can get hired at 62. Go me!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164408255549808052006-11-24T14:44:00.000-08:002006-11-24T14:44:00.000-08:00So is it true that only college hires are L59/L60?...<I>So is it true that only college hires are L59/L60? I was hired as a 59 and had years of experience coming in. Another co-worker was hired recently as a L60 and she had years of experience coming in as well</I><BR/><BR/>They got you cheap or they believe you're limited.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164383532974175002006-11-24T07:52:00.000-08:002006-11-24T07:52:00.000-08:00So is it true that only college hires are L59/L60?...So is it true that only college hires are L59/L60? I was hired as a 59 and had years of experience coming in. Another co-worker was hired recently as a L60 and she had years of experience coming in as wellAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164383451951771872006-11-24T07:50:00.000-08:002006-11-24T07:50:00.000-08:00Someone wrote >"MSN?>Yusuf? Blake?>You're joking, ...Someone wrote <BR/><BR/>>"MSN?<BR/><BR/>>Yusuf? Blake?<BR/><BR/>>You're joking, right?<BR/><BR/>>let's see, MSN Search is now in the single digits in terms of market share... Blake has poured lots of money into that, but of course, he and the same poker playing cronies are running the show..."<BR/><BR/>-- <BR/><BR/>Everyone at MSN knows that Blake NEVER ran Search. Before the recent set of reorgs Blake ran properties like Messenger, Spaces and Hotmail. Also everyone should know that after the reorg Search now falls under SteveSi's dominion. <BR/><BR/>This is all public knowledge that you can obtain at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass <BR/><BR/>This is another instance that makes me suspect that a lot of the folks trolling on here don't even work at Microsoft. <BR/><BR/>-- DareAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555958.post-1164334321080429222006-11-23T18:12:00.000-08:002006-11-23T18:12:00.000-08:00Happy Thanksgiving everyone.In salaried job arrang...Happy Thanksgiving everyone.<BR/><BR/>In salaried job arrangements, employees are empowered to set their hourly compensation. For most Dev/Test/PM IC jobs, $100/hr represents a good work/life balance.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com