Is the issue that Google, as a company, is not addressing user happiness enough? Or is the issue that some organization is letting bugs languish? The first is a much harder problem than the second. You don't need to solve the first to fix the second. I stand by my claim that it is feasible to address the first as an L5, that could reasonably get someone promo'd to 6, and you wouldn't need to involve anyone above a director to do it. Of course, doing so would involve writing very little code, because so much of this is procedural and political, so the engineer who just wants to be rewarded for fixing bugs wouldn't take the initiative to solve this problem. But alas.
Is the issue that Google, as a company, is not addressing user happiness enough? Or is the issue that some organization is letting bugs languish? The first is a much harder problem than the second. You don't need to solve the first to fix the second. I stand by my claim that it is feasible to address the first as an L5, that could reasonably get someone promo'd to 6, and you wouldn't need to involve anyone above a director to do it. Of course, doing so would involve writing very little code, because so much of this is procedural and political, so the engineer who just wants to be rewarded for fixing bugs wouldn't take the initiative to solve this problem. But alas.