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Originally Posted by Mihkel05
Ironically a product manager could be a T8, but again you're either a T8 or an L8.
No, L8 applies across the whole company so it's not an either or but L8 within tech org is sometimes called T8. This isn't a google-specific thing either - most large tech companies operate similarly, though not every place applies the ladder consistently outside of engineering - I'm guessing it originally came from IBM though I could be wrong.
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Regardless, I'm not sure how this digression, other than illuminating a fundamental misunderstanding you have, is relevant.
That would be an ironic thing to say given how we ended up on this digression. But I'm always to happy to help others learn. You could've just said your friend is considering a management position so you're expecting advice on that front, but you started this pedantic digression to correct what you thought was a mistake on my part, well for reasons that may be clear to some here.
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So the question of whether someone is "technical" is irrelevant as all L8s are middle managers.
I hope you now understand how things are but regardless of this point, it's also incorrect to consider engineering middle managers at Google non-technical because you're expected to understand the work at a highly technical level as a middle manager. Larry Page himself is known to work with the most junior engineers on the most minute details - there's a CS-inspired term for this phenomenon which I won't divulge here. I suppose one general thing I could say about middle management at Google is that middle managers are not allowed to shy away from details and use their position as an excuse to do so. It's not a flat organization by any means but it is expected that middle managers be able to function as though it were a flat organization. Larry Page himself at one point thought managers in general were useless and tried to transition every engineering manager back into an IC role. While this itself was wisely prevented, the cultural impact endures, along with the example set by Larry Page himself.
And of course, no, not all middle managers do the same thing - job function matters greatly and the area you work in also matters greatly. Your life as a recruiting director in Copenhagen would have very little to do with the experience of an eng. director in Mountain View working on Google Maps, who would also have a very different life from a product director in Boulder working on cloud platform. While this is already true at every company, it can be more true at Google because the expectations are higher - you have to bring something to the table that's specific to the role, beyond merely general skills as a manager. To the extent that managing people itself is considered a specific skill, it also has to do with mentoring your reports and ensuring their growth, both in terms of skills and overall career development, which of course are very specific to the job function and the area. Even within product, especially in certain specialized areas, growth is dependent on domain-specific knowledge that doesn't translate to other roles.
Furthermore, all of this is even more true if you're an external hire at this level - some roles at this level are more generic than others but the more generic the role is, the more likely that they would've just filled internally. There's no shortage of talent at Google at this level. So the very fact that this role is available externally makes it highly likely that there are specifics about this role that will make the experience unusual relative to a generic middle management role at Google.
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I'm also shocked to learn that back office people in tech companies would possibly make less than people in product.
It seems you're a bit confused here too but I'd be happy to explain if you have any questions as to what I meant.
As for the L vs T distinction, I think this does a better job of explaining than I did anyhow:
https://www.quora.com/What-are-all-t...l-career-track
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The entire Google has the same leveling system. This is somewhat rare (meaning that levels are comparable between Tech roles and non-Tech roles). It’s often written as L followed by a number. For example, L5 means “level 5”. This notation is consistent across Tech and non-Tech.
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Within Tech, there’s another notation, as the letter T followed by the number, for example, T5 means “level 5 in Tech”.
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Now to make the landscape complicated (which is what Google Engineering likes to do), there is a parallel Eng Management Ladder.
T5, also known as Eng Manager I.
T6, also known as Eng Manager II.
T7, also known as Eng Manager III.
T8, also known as Eng Director.
T9, also known as Senior Eng Director.
T10, also known as Eng VP.
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T5, Product Manager II
T6, Product Manager III
T7, Senior Product Manager
T7.5, Group Product Manager
To be promoted to GPM (or any levels after this), SPM must manage a team of junior PMs. This is different from Eng where Senior Staff Software Engineer can be promoted to Principal Software Engineer without being a manager.
T8, Product Manager Director
T9, Senior Product Manager Director
T10, PM VP