When a door closes, a window opens. At least I think that’s how the saying goes. Anyway, BlackBerry’s recent troubles, which I’m sure you’ve heard about by now, can be blamed on terrible management, not terrible employees. Chances are there’s quite a few number of people sitting in Waterloo, BlackBerry’s hometown, that are extremely talented. So it should be of no surprise then to hear that Motorola (technically Google, right?) has plans to go on a “hiring spree” in the Kitchener-Waterloo area.
How many employees are they looking to hire? The Financial Post doesn’t go into any details, but Derek Phillips, Engineering Director at Motorola Canada, says: “We’ve got big plans and we’re very optimistic.” Note that BlackBerry has said they’re going to fire 4,500 people in all, so here’s hoping Google ends up buying a massive office to give all those people a home.
What can BlackBerry employees teach Google? First thing that comes to mind is how to deal with the enterprise. Google may be all free and hippy and California-like, but businesses want to deal with suits, and BlackBerry is about as loaded with suits as you can get. And the second thing is tight code.
I’m not sure if you’ve ever used a BlackBerry device, personally I’ve never owned one, but I had several friends who did, and man, they’re extremely snappy. Zero hesitation, zero lag, even on ancient specs. Google sure could make Android a bit cleaner.