Terrible Job at Google - HR Reacts

You can be good at your career, heck even great, but that doesn't mean that you like it. Actually, it could be making you completely miserable. And that's what was happening for Melissa Ong. You may recognize Melissa as Chunky's dead. She is a hilarious comedian and she shared a vulnerable video about how she went throughout her career working at companies like Yahoo and Google only to realize the dark side of working at these companies. While she had been chasing this objective of having the shiny title at the big cool company, it ended up making her really unhappy in her life. I am going to react to her story because there is so much that we can learn from this situation so that you can make sure that your next career move is sure footed and fulfilling. If you're new here, this is self made Millennial. I'm Madeline Mann. I am a human resources leader and job search strategist. You may have seen me on abc, Bloomberg, Wall Street Journal and make sure to subscribe to to learn how to go from job searching to job shopping. Let's dive into Melissa's story.

Growing up I was actually an extremely creative kid, but I somehow grew to deny myself of those creative instincts because it was very instilled into me by my parents and by the people around me that I needed to be on a traditional path to success. Traditional meaning doing well in school, getting into a good college, and then having some sort of prestigious corporate profession. I even told my parents I wanted to get into acting, but they brushed it off as childish dreams.

So this is disappointing that her parents didn't allow her to do acting because while I understand they might have trepidations about her going into acting as a career, what I think we often get confused about is confusing hobbies with career paths. So by taking theater classes or acting or pursuing that, that would help her in lots of different parts of her life. It might help her with her charisma, her ability to present. I know for me I did theater growing up and so many of those skills helped me to be a great facilitator to even talk on camera here where I didn't become an but I was able to then parlay that. And so what you want to do is you want to look at what are you passionate about and then take it a step deeper. So if she's passionate about acting, that doesn't mean that she needs to become an actor. It means that you need to look at what aspects of that could be utilized in a career path.

In high school I didn't like any subjects. I absolutely hated English and history and I still do. And I was like kind of okay at math and science, but I didn't really like those subjects either. But at the time my high school brain thought that those were the only two types of people you could be be. And I was like, okay, I guess I'll be a math and science person since it's the lesser of the two evils.

Yeah, I do hate that about school, how it makes us think that there's essentially two categories of people, the science and math, the history and English, and if you don't fit in those buckets, there's no space for you. That is such an inaccurate way of thinking about the world. And I think we need to start expanding our thoughts. Even college majors are way too restrictive. When I think about how I chose my career path in hr, I didn't even know what HR was for most of my life, right. And I got a psychology degree and everyone was telling me to be a therapist or be a researcher when really I had to take active effort to look outside of those boxes that everyone puts you in. So narrow when there's so much more potential. There's so many other things that you can do and be great at and could find fulfilling, but they're not as obvious.

Fast forward to 2011. I graduated high school and started attending college at UC Berkeley. At Berkeley, I was surrounded by people who were very career driven. All of my friends were either pursuing engineering, business or medicine. And I felt very pressured to do do the same. I can't believe I really thought those were my only three options.

This is what I call TV careers, which are essentially the 12 careers that every single TV character seems to have. It's doctor, lawyer, teacher, journalist, and we do put ourselves in these boxes. There are so many other options. No one in our lives pushes us in those less known directions and so we need to push ourselves. One thing I've done is, is I've created this system called a one page career vision, which is an eight step system where you're able to figure out exactly what your next step should be so you're able to understand the different aspects of you, your background, your skills, your strengths and then find jobs out there that would be the perfect fit. And then translate your skills to make sure that you're landing those jobs. If you're looking for coaching on that, I will link some information down below. But really this is something that takes a lot of intentional work. So know that this is not necessarily easy and that's why so many people struggle with it. For so long in their life. But if you have a systematic approach, it can help you a lot.

And when I was in college, I was still very insecure and deeply wanting of people's approval, which made me very motivated by perceived success. I feel like it was so ingrained in the culture of the people around me to constantly prove to your peers that you had value through both your academic and professional accomplishments. So I pursued being successful in that same sort of way that if I could get the prestigious internships and work at the prestigious companies, that that would make feel validated and stable and happy. Obviously, I was wrong, which is why I'm here now.

This is hustle culture and it's so brutal and toxic. And when we care so much about what others think, we look back on our life and realize, wow, I didn't actually do what I wanted to do. And the way you live your days is the way you live your life. So even if what you're doing sounds really interesting and impresses people, if your day to day is not good, you're not winning.

Once I graduated from Berkeley, I started working at Yahoo. And once I started working, I could feel deep down inside that I didn't like or care for the work that I was doing, that I didn't like being in a corporate environment, and that the tech industry actually did not interest me in the slightest. But again, I thought that this was the only possible career path for me. So I tried to force myself to like it. I would lie to myself every day and make excuses for why I should stay at this job, saying things to myself like, oh, well, tech has such great perks and benefits like free food and flexible working. And so many people don't have that at their job. So I should be happy here, right? Or I'd tell myself, you know what, it's okay to hate my job. Like, don't most people hate their jobs anyway? And I thought to myself that it would all balance out because the money I was making from my job could pay for things that would make me happy outside of work.

I hear this all the time from people who are good at their job and they work at good companies, but they think, okay, so I have it all and I have a good paycheck. This must be it. Everyone's miserable and I need to live with this. That is absolutely not the case. I cannot emphasize it enough. From even my own experience and all my clients experience, you can find something that really fits. Well now she did mention that her salary can then fund the other things in her life that she's enjoys. So I don't want to paint this rosy picture of work should always be fun and if you have a job you love, you'll never work a day. I don't necessarily believe that. I do believe that if you have work that feels meaningful, allows you to live the lifestyle you like, plays to your strengths, doesn't compromise any of your values, lights you up, gets you in a flow state, that is what I'm talking about as the type of work you should pursue. And of course if you love horse riding, that doesn't mean that your full time role will be horse riding. And as long as you're paid well and you have the right flexibility, you'll be able to afford to have a horse and afford to go riding on the weekend and whatnot. So what Melissa's saying is absolutely true of you do want a job that financially also allows you to do things outside of work. But it doesn't have to be so polarizing where work is terrible and then outside of work is great. We can find a more balanced medium. Now if you are feeling like you're struggling to find that right next role and land that elevated career, then I recommend coming to my free five day masterclass called Upgrade your career. If it's not running right now, make sure to get on the wait list. I will link that below.

I hated it so much and kept trying different things to force myself to stay on this career path. I would say to myself I don't like what I'm doing but I don't know what I would do otherwise. So I guess I have to find a way to make myself keep doing this. I found myself switching teams and roles and companies in pursuit of finding the right fit within the tech industry just to make me not even content but just less abysmally miserable at my job.

This is a huge misconception. You do not need to take a job to know whether or not it is a good choice for you. Look before you leap. Do this deep work. Do this one page career vision. Do this deep systematic work where you are understanding exactly what is going into these next roles. And I did this for about 50 different roles before I chose human reason, Resources. I really dove in, talked to people in these different professions, all that stuff before taking the job. Because if you take the jobs then figure out that's not right for you. Years of your life go by of you kind of trying all the different porridge like Goldilocks and years go by and you realize, wow, I'm still not happy.

But every time I tried something new within the industry, I kept coming to the same conclusion. And every time I made a change, I just got to that conclusion faster. One of the last lies I told myself was, you know what? I'm probably not happy because I'm not at Google or Facebook. Those are supposedly the happiest places to work if you're in the tech industry. So if I can just get into one of those companies, I'll be happy with this career.

This idea of working at these big shiny companies will make you happy is such a dangerous trap. Oh my goodness. I did a reaction video which I can link below of where I reacted to colors of Chloe's video about where she talked about the toxic culture she experienced at TikTok and why she ultimately ended up leaving. And so it's so important that you do things like the one page career vision or the wealth formula where you are understanding exactly what you want next and being sure that the company you're going towards rises to those standards. And just because it has a cool name, a fancy name, a big name, that doesn't mean it's going to be the right fit.

I worked my ass off to get into Google, which ironically ended up being the company I was most miserable at. I totally thought I had my life and my future all figured out, but the long term plans I had set for myself just completely shattered once I realized that there is no way I can keep doing something I hate every day for the rest of my life.

I feel so much for Melissa here. You know exactly how Melissa's feeling right now. If you've ever been in a job that felt suffocating, put in the comments if you relate to Melissa because this is so relatable. I will say that if a company is costing you your well being then no matter what your salary is, they are not paying you enough.

I vividly remember getting my bonus at 12am on Thursday night and I literally submit my resignation at 12:01 and left the next day. The day I quit was the happy happiest I had been in years. I felt such an intense freedom and relief and I was literally running and jumping through the office halls in joy.

I love this for her. If you ever leave a job and you feel that relief, that is such a clear signal that you made the right decision. I'm just glad she didn't let it go on any longer.

Shout out to Melissa After I quit Google, I got so much backlash and unsolicited opinions from the people around me for my decision. Thankfully not from my close friends who have always been really supportive of me. It was more coming from my peripheral friends and acquaintances. They were all like, what, you quit Google to try and become social media famous? Do you know how hard it is to make it in that industry? What if you don't make it? What's your backup plan?

Here's the thing is we are going to get so much career advice from people in our lives and you have to take a look at who's giving that advice. Have they been where you want to be? It's different if maybe these people who were talking to Melissa were, hey, I've already become social media famous or I've already gone down this path and here's why I don't think you should do it. But I have a feeling that those people really don't have the context. So make sure that you're not taking career advice from maybe a parent or a professor. If you're not going into academia or just someone who is maybe not necessarily in the field that you're looking to go into or has the context to know exactly what your next step should be. Look for the right mentors and coaches who can help get you to that next level and direct you in the right way.

When I downloaded TikTok, I just told myself, I'm going to keep posting until I get a million followers. So in January, I started aggressively posting TikTok content, making anywhere from three to 10 videos a day, every day. I just made whatever came to mind and didn't overthink it. I had no idea what I was doing. And to be honest, I still don't. I just was and still am trying a ton of stuff and learning and growing from the process. These past six months, literally from the moment I woke up to the moment I fell asleep, I was hustling, making as many videos as possible. It took me two months to get my first 10,000 followers. And then after that, it started snowballing. After 10k, I was getting another 10k every week until I hit 100k. And then at that point I started getting another 100k every until I had almost a million followers.

What's really cool about Melissa's story is she really, she had a plan, she had goals, and she was extremely focused on achieving those. She did not cut corners. She's also extremely talented, but I'm sure that talent was cultivated from the reps she put in, from how much she was putting into her craft. And so that is huge and a huge part of success.

I'm now at the point where I'm trying to expand my comedy to other platforms such as YouTube, Instagram and Twitter. And I'm also working on a podcast, writing a book, writing a TV show, as well as preparing stand up for when we can all leave our houses again. This is all super new to me, but I'm just going to try my best, like how I did with TikTok and learn and grow from my mistake.

Well, I absolutely super appreciate Melissa's story. I'm sure you do too. And what I hope you take away from it is Soul Search before you job search. It's not about going for the role that sounds really sexy and prestigious at that company with the big name. No, because it's so important that you are actually vetting these opportunities. Do informational interviews. I'll give you that guide of what questions to ask. We'll link it below and make sure that you are understanding what you're getting yourself into before pursuing it. Because there's so many more opportunities than what you know right now. If you want to hear how I went through this journey because I talked to people in about 50 different professions before I narrowed it down and chose my career path in human resources. And because that career was so invigorating, it was so fulfilling, it lit me up. I then started creating content and building an audience just really organically. I never thought it was going to be a business or anything like that. And now I'm the CEO of a coaching business and I just couldn't feel more fortunate. And if you want to know my full story, I will link that video down below. But it really all started with getting to know myself, getting to know what I could do for the world, how I could be employable, and choosing a job that really lit me up. Thanks so much to Melissa Ong for sharing your story with us and also your incredible humor. And be sure to like this video and subscribe to this channel. You've got this Wi Fi high five.