The headline is a bit deceptive given it's written by an internal recruiter; I imagine anyone not working as part of a business' main thrust could find the same problem. That said, it does sound horribly tedious and pointless. Of my two interactions with Google hiring (both failures on my part, both pre-2006), one was enjoyable but messy and the second was brusque and confusing.
This was my reaction too. Mike Rowe would probably look dimly upon the author's complaints. Sometimes, companies hire people to do unpleasant jobs, and convince them to do these jobs by paying them.
But, it's tough to have that conversation from the position of privilege one sits in when one gets paid even more to do an interesting job, because of the scarcity of people capable of performing in that role. Presumably the kid understands this harsh reality, and the complaint is more reflective of a general disillusionment that the situation is as it is, rather than an aversion to the particularities of this role at Google.
> Sometimes, companies hire people to do unpleasant jobs, and convince them to do these jobs by paying them.
What I got was that the requirement for overt enthusiasm over a mundane job became too much. I don't think Mike Row would see it the same way if a sewage technician was forced to pretend their job was "making a better world one bowel movement at a time" or face being ostracized.
I did not get the sense that the author was ostracized. Rather, they were put off by other people's enthusiasm. "Am I the only one here who can see this job is crap?" I can totally understand that feeling being crazy-making, but it's different than being ostracized.
I do think that the OP's job as a recruiter could have been better if the culture within his team or the recruiting dept was better. Sure, it's a monotonous job, but im guessing if the team was a small startup located in SF external to Google and they could do things their own way instead of answering to and belonging to a huge HR department with immense pressure to get as many candidates in as possible, and grow their own culture, the job wouldn't feel so tedious and pointless.
Sometimes it's hard to feel like you're doing great things and making a difference when what you do is a drop of water in a great sea that is Google, vs the same drop in a smaller bucket of water.
