Google: Foreign workers are key to our success

By Anne Broache
Staff Writer, CNET News.com Published: June 6, 2007 10:33 AM PDT

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WASHINGTON--A Google executive on Wednesday credited the company's phenomenal success to the United States' openness to immigrants and called on Congress to let in more foreign workers.

Laszlo Bock, the search giant's vice president of people operations--Googlespeak for human resources--said the company may never have come into existence if co-founder Sergey Brin and his parents hadn't been able to flee the Soviet Union for the U.S. when he was 6 years old. Wednesday's testimony represents the first time that Google has testified before Congress on immigration issues.

"Within Google, there are countless examples of immigrants and nonimmigrant foreign workers playing a vital role in our company," Bock told the politicians at a House Judiciary oversight subcommittee hearing focused on business community perspectives on immigration law changes. The hearing took place as the Senate continues to debate a massive immigration bill that has proven worrisome to Silicon Valley companies.

Holders of H-1B visas, which allow foreigners with certain credentials to hold U.S. jobs for up to six years, compose about 8 percent of Google's U.S. workforce and represent 80 different countries, Bock said. He estimated that 75 percent of those hires have degrees from U.S. universities. Some led the development of Google News and Orkut, the company's social-networking site, he added.

"It is no stretch to say that without these employees, we might not be able to develop future revolutionary products like the next Gmail or the next Google Earth."

--Laszlo Bock, Google vice president of people operations

"It is no stretch to say that without these employees, we might not be able to develop future revolutionary products like the next Gmail or the next Google Earth," Bock said. He added that the influence is not limited to Google: Intel, eBay, Yahoo and Sun Microsystems are among the prominent Silicon Valley firms that were also founded by immigrants.

Bock himself said he fled communist Romania with his family as a child in the 1970s. His mother, who started a business consulting firm upon the family's move to Claremont, Calif., sat behind him at the hearing and, after she was publicly introduced, pulled out a handkerchief to dab her eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses.

Because of a current shortage in H-1B visas, Google has ultimately been forced to deny jobs to more than 70 qualified foreign candidates in the last year, Bock said. Echoing the stance of large high-tech companies like Microsoft, he urged Congress to enact "significant" increases to the annual cap, which currently numbers 65,000 but can grow by tens of thousands more when various exemptions are taken into account.

The Google executive also asked Congress to take actions to alleviate the significant backlog in awarding green cards, which grant permanent residency. The lack of rapid assurance that foreign-born employees on temporary visas can remain on U.S. company payrolls forces "tens of thousands of highly trained professionals into legal and professional limbo for years."

Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), who counts Google in her Silicon Valley constituency, said she was sympathetic to those requests. Particularly in the high-tech sector, "without consistent, simple access to the best and brightest minds in the world, America will likely face stiffer competition from abroad," the subcommittee chairwoman said at the hearing.

Not everyone was so eager to make changes without further assurances. A handful of Democrats questioned whether Google has been doing enough to recruit qualified Americans, particularly blacks. Bock admitted Google would like to boost the number of blacks on its payroll, but he said the company offers scholarships in partnership with the United Negro College Fund and has done recruitment on the campuses of historically black colleges.

Before Congress moves forward with an overhaul of immigration law along the lines of Bock's requests, politicians need to focus on what to do about the some 12 million illegal immigrants living in the country, said subcommittee ranking member Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa). He said he supported a point system aimed at determining who is most qualified to enter the country legally.

"Could Google produce the software that would identify for us the very top 1 million people on the globe who would want to apply to come to the United States who could give the best enhancement to our country here?" King asked the company executive.

"It's an interesting question," Bock responded. "I'm sure we'd have lots of people who would want to tackle that problem in their 20 percent time."

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Add a Comment (Log in or register) 115 comments (Page 1 of 3)

Google..........google
by Sunidaze June 6, 2007 10:54 AM PDT: I could care less how big or global you think you need to be. America has plenty of technically skilled people to build your company. We don't need no new stinking immigrants doing our jobs. Bottom line, more cheap labor and global elitist attitudes.; Reply to this comment View reply
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Um, No and, Um, No
by bluerain44 June 6, 2007 11:14 AM PDT: Google isn't doing enough to hire Americans, period. Google, Microsoft and Oracle ceased being 'american companies' long ago. They deserve no special treatment from the United States. Let them move to another country, and see if their IP is as well protected as it is here. Go be China and India's whipping boys. You'll all of a sudden find out that no H1Bs are a small price to pay for doing business in the largest domestic economy in the world.; Reply to this comment View reply
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Google uses h-1b body shops to find employees
by Jake Leone June 6, 2007 11:52 AM PDT: Google: splendid case of friends hiring friends The 8% h-1b workforce at Google, is gearing up to increase to 30% and then massively offshore. It took while for me to piece this together, but you really have to know someone at Google to get hired into Google. Of the 4 people I have know who have gone to Google, all had contacts inside the company that they said landed them an interview. I have interviewed several candidates coming to my company from Google, at least three claimed to be Unix gurus but couldn't use (some not even aware) the Unix "ps" command or similar simple Unix commands. I have also know several people who have applied to Google, and were never even considered for a phone interview, some with more than 10 years of experience, earning well into six figures at their company. These are excellent workers, top-notch people, and Google wouldn't consider them. Google's a nice company, but you need contacts to be hired their. That is the reason for the big h-1b push at Google. Indian nationals stick together (can you blame them), they hire eachother into positions, Google works for them. Additionally, it's clear that Google uses h-1b body-shops right and left. Of the Google candidates 3 were working for a 3rd party recruitment agency and were here on an h-1b. As for success, well Google is Wall Streets darling. And I attribute much of their success to basically this: - Very thin and quick load time - Exploiting Usenet posts to get 60-minutes (and other news org-time) focused on them. (Reminds me a lot of the early body-part sales on Ebay) - Now moving into the exploitation of copyrighted material (which could be a big mistake if content-provider lawsuits are successful) You cannot discriminate in the hiring by race, creed, or NATIONALITY. When Indian companies only consider h-1b candidates (and then only from from India), for jobs based in the United States, it is a clear case of discrimination. Prejudice in hiring decisions is a crime in the United States, it violates Federal Civil Rights laws. When companies are found to have violated such laws the punishment can include criminal sentences. The main question is, if there is a job in the United States, do Indian IT companies (that are h-1b dependent) even consider a non-Indian candidate? So far all evidence, and all the numbers point to a the startling fact, U.S. engineering candidates are barred from applying for U.S. jobs created by Indian IT companies. Some of these Indian IT companies have U.S. staff that is 90% or more Indian, and almost all here on h-1b visas. In open testimony before congress, a U.S. Citizen and job applicant tried to get an interview with for an open position in the United States. She was told that she could not apply for the job, just (and only because) because she could not be hired under an h-1b Visa. Congress is merely asking questions, and India is protesting way-to-loudly. Something aweful (a complete disregard for Civil Rights) is being coverd up by the whole Indian IT industry and the Indian government. There is no equality in the hiring practices of these h-1b dependent Indian IT companies, either you are Indian or you are not, that is the hiring criteria for an Engineer at an h-1b dependent Indian IT company for a job based in the United States. This clearly is discrimination, this is prejudice, this is wrong, and against U.S. law. The american people have the right to know when companies are destroying the very fabric of our society, by planting the seeds of racism, prejudice, and discrimination. India threatens us with trade sanctions unless allow their companies to continue to discrimate. Call their bluff, India needs trade with the U.S. more than the reverse. Further what good is trade, if it leads to riots, protest, and civil unrest. Discrimination, more than any other, is something that we all agree needs to be eliminated. The Senators are merely asking questions. Clearly though, we need to subpoena these companies. This is the biggest case of open-discrimination, bigotry, and prejudice in the United States today. Karmal Nath (the Indian Commerce Minister) and NASSCOM (the Indian Service Companies group) knows Indian IT companies discriminate against U.S. citizens. They know that that Indian IT companies practice discrimination in the United States. And they are trying to black-mail the U.S. into letting it continue.; Reply to this comment View all 2 replies
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H1B experience
by wildcat1975 June 6, 2007 11:59 AM PDT: My company posted a job for a web developer. After reading the requirements I went to HR and told them that no one could possibly meet the requirements because some of them were just made up acronyms or proprietary software only used within the company. I was told that the posting was written that way because legal told them that before they could get an H1B they had to look for an American. The ad was written so that anyone applying for the job that wouldn't work for half pay could be rejected for not filling the requirements. There is a reason that the fat cats want more H1Bs and it is definately not because they can't find Americans to do the work. They just can't find them at the slave market. I mean the guys from Google, Microsoft, et al are worth how many billions? They disgust me!; Reply to this comment View all 2 replies
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Google rejects capable US citizens
by BatmanG8 June 6, 2007 2:17 PM PDT: Google sets its recruiting requirements 3 levels up from the job for which they're hiring and then whines "shortage". http://www.kermitrose.com/econ200701.html#20070124 When their recruiters do call back it's to play "trivial pursuit", quizzing about rarely used bits of CS trivia rather than the sorts of things one would need every day on the job. This is also biased in favor of guest-workers from countries in which rote memorization is emphasized and handicaps them by rejecting those with "dynamic" and creative problem-solving skills as Vivek Wadhwa, former body shopper and now assistant prof. at Duke University called it. So, at the same time firms such as Google are whining that they can't find people with these creative abilities, which occur more amongst people in the US, they are recruiting for rote memorization. And they're doing dirty work for the Red Chinese government.; Reply to this comment View all 2 replies
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Make US Education Affordable!!!
by theitdude June 6, 2007 4:26 PM PDT: I know 3 Indian programmers - very talented. They said they went to universities in India for next to nothing. Here in the US, it costs you more for 1 semester of text books.; Reply to this comment View all 2 replies
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The key to their success?
by chuck_whealton June 6, 2007 6:40 PM PDT: It's not foreign workers. It's highly overvalued stock. It's frightening when people will allow themselves to get ripped off like that. Charles R. Whealton Charles Whealton @ pleasedontspam.com; Reply to this comment

I ceased to think well of Google today
by asdf June 6, 2007 8:34 PM PDT: The accumulated good will they had with me, the "do no evil" slogan, etc etc.. all of that is gone for me. They're just another company filled to the gills with H1Bs who will only hire people of their own race, who are filled with racial superiority, who are determined to bring their 3rd world mentality to the US. Don't tell me that H1Bs don't torpedo the candidacy of non-H1bs. I have sat there in interviews for MAJOR companies while H1B after H1B desperately dig around in their memory for some detail of my expertise I might get wrong, and when that didn't work, openly used a school book in front of me and asked me the most obscure questions and when THAT didn't work, then told me that I was pretty smart and began asking me questions like how would I react if I wasn't in charge of everything and similar non-sequitors.. looking for anything to cite as a "reason" for not hiring me. Don't tell me employers don't deliberately exclude Americans from consideration for positions. I sat there while my employer slyly admitted to me that as soon as he got a resume from the local in his state, he just threw it in the garbage without looking further. He had all H1Bs except for myself and I was there only because of my specialty. Don't tell me that Sun and MS and Google don't discriminate based on nationality, because we all know they do, we the real people who really are deep in the bowels f the machine and really know what happens. Your government is a government by for and of big business. They're not gong to enforce their own laws, investigate wrong doing or anything else. They ceased to be a government by for and of the people a while ago. That's a terminal condition. IF America believes it can replace manufacturing and technology jobs with "service sector" jobs and the creation of money through "financial services" , i.e. loans to consumers who are losing their jobs and will never pay back with interest that money despite the banks having booked it as revenue... if America believes that it can keep on borrowing t buy junk at Walmart where all it citizens work and the dollar won't crash... then they're delusional. The only ting for rational people to do is - get out. Just leave America, because it's going to implode under the Enronesque accounting practices that are telling us the economy is "booming" ... it's a den of thieves (Haliburton Carlyle Group, Exxon, Enron, Global Crossing, on and on and on), of players Randy "Duke Cuninningham, McCain, Kyl, Hatch, Hillary and all the other politicians, of liars (see above), of amoral, valueless predators out to get "theirs" any way they can end of story (the CEOs of these companies and their lackeys...). It's a house of cards that's going to collapse. Europeans don't do this to themselves but then Europeans aren't being run by criminals and cronies. Get out and go to Europe and take your brains and innovation with you. We'll see how the US does when it's filled to the gills with the H1Bs Google so desperately wants. Our ancestors came here for freedom and to our revolution was about the rights of the People. Now a corptocracy has taken over and people who work are back to being serfs who merely rent land and their ability to survive from the Lord, er, I mean corporation , that effectively owns them. Get out and go to Europe where they don't put up with innovation-killing crap like software patents and non-expiring copyrights (just search for Disney and copyright law) and all the rest of the rules that are tailored to keep the wealthy wealthy. It's not impossible to make it in America, it's just much less likely than other countries : http://www.sightline.org/daily_score/archive/2007/05/29/bye-bye-economic-mobility http://www.economicmobility.org/assets/pdfs/EMP%20American%20Dream%20Report.pdf and the consequences for failure- no health care for you or your children, no meaningful job, no social security, work until you're dead just to keep alive... are murderous. The US used to be a place that rewarded work. Now it rewards being rich and has nothing but contempt for people who work. It's time to do what our forefathers did- leave. Leave the US to the cockroaches like this guy from Google. Europe is not a fifth as corrupt as the US. Do you want to take your best ideas and best energy and best years of your life making the dirtbag CEOs at Google and other companies yet richer so they can turn around tell you you're not fit for their job as soon as they get a new boatload of H1Bs here? That's a slave's mentality. Is that what you had in mind for your life? Is that what you dreamed your life would be about when you were young? Break Google. Take them apart. They want to drive you into poverty so they can have another billion in their bank account. They're just like Microsoft- not one ounce better. Let's see how Google fares now that millions of the world's most capable programmers hate their guts and want them to fail. Let's see what kind of market share they hold onto now that they've lost developer mindshare.; Reply to this comment View reply
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Google should extend out of the USA
by hadaso June 7, 2007 1:51 AM PDT: Instead of bringing talents into the USA Google should employ people in their own countries, or in countries that are easier with foreign workers of international companies. From the story it seems that many people who study in US universities with student visas that usually require them to go back to their homelands for some minimal period after they complete their studies (so that they can get jobs there). Google would do more good by spreading out to the rest of the world. It is not that difficult nowadays to collaborate without being physically present in the same campus. And when time comes for physical meetings, there are much better places to meet than the USA which makes it very difficult to enter the country. (Canada or Europe are much more accomodating for travelers).; Reply to this comment

not good news for american workforce.
by inachu June 7, 2007 5:35 AM PDT: If your company depends 100% on H1 and L1 transfers and illegals to keep your building clean then your company deserves to fail.; Reply to this comment View reply
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