Google Offices and Travel
Contents
About
One of the things about Google I'm thankful for is "working remotely". Google has many perks, but one perk people forget is that Google has offices all over the world, and most bosses will approve of you working from a remote location for a week or two, without the need to dip into your precious vacation time.
Better yet, if you happen to collaborate with a team in a different city, you might be told to or approved to take an expense paid trip to that city!
List of Google Trips
- 2013:
- Sydney, AU ..................... (1 week) ???? 201? - first trip to visit parents, stayed with "gHosts" Sam & Nicole.
- 2014:
- Sydney, AU ..................... (1 week) ???? 201?.
- 2015:
- Seattle, Washington ..................... (1 week) ???? 201? + jun 2018.
- 2016:
- Los Angeles, CA ..................... (1 week) jun 2016 - friend's wedding.
- Sydney, AU ..................... (1 week) dec 2016 - stayed with Sam & Nicole on the way to my family for Xmas.
- 2017:
- Tokyo, Japan * ..................... (1 week) feb 2017 - (PAID TRIP).
- 2018:
- Seattle, Washington ..................... (1 week) jun 2018 - stayed with a friend on a boat then to meet up with my family to do a cruise from Vancouver to Anchorage (Alaska).
- Pittsburg, Pennsylvania ..................... (1 week) sep 2018 - stayed with a friend in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. This was a relatively small office (a few floors only), but still good food in their one cafe.
- 2019:
- New York, New York * ..................... (1 week) mar 2019 - (PAID TRIP). Was working with NY menu people.
- Berlin, Germany ..................... (1 week) mar 2019 - stayed with a friend, then met up with some buddies in Barcelona for a 2 week Europe trip!
- Austin, Texas ..................... (1 week) oct 2019 - for a wedding of two lovely friends. Self funded, and I decided to do a few days in Houston first. The Austin Google office is beautiful.
- Atlanta, Georgia ..................... (1 week) dec 2019 - to visit a friend.
- Other Offices I've seen but not worked in: Toronto (jun 2015).
My Paid Google Trips
I've been in Google, under Geo since 2012 (7 years at the time of writing), and sadly only scored 2 paid trips. I say only, because that's pretty little by Google standards. But fortunately one of them was Tokyo Japan, which was great, and my only regret was that I should have gone for 2 weeks instead of 1.... Not just for seeing more of Tokyo in 2017, but when you work with a remote team and interact with their codebase, you can make progress twice as fast when you sit with that team.
My Self Sponsored Trips
In the US, Google full timer workers start with 15 days (3 weeks) vacation, then 4 weeks after 3 years and it maxes outa at 5 weeks after 5 years. That's great by US standards, but when you fly to the other side of the world you lose a lot of time to flight, so it makes great sense to immediately go to work in a nearby office and I feel like it's half a vacation. YOu're still going to work in the morning, but you can pay for your own hotel or stay with friends... and as soon as you leave the office each day you are in a new city you can explore! :)
For me, this first started when I visited my parents in Australia, and I realized I wanted dot see the Sydney office, maybe even consider the idea of moving to the Sydney office one day.
See Also
Links
- Google Office Locations - official site, showing a map of Google locations.
