I recently had a small company take a month and had after the final two 'interviews' with the CEO and CTO were scheduled a week apart, realized this is almost certainly a stalling tactic to have a couple more candidates in the pipeline so they can pick the best.

I think it should be the other way around.

Google is a very large company. They have capital on hand and an established, well-worn process for onboarding. It costs them comparatively little to hire.

For a small company, an engineering hire is a big investment. They don't do it as often, so it costs them more in terms of both direct costs and indirect costs - like the time it takes their existing team to go through the process and bring the new hire up to speed.

Agreed, when I was recruiting for a small company (where we could be easily outbid), the only tool I really had was that the process was 1 interview and I made a decision. This was before remote absolutely exploded but I was able to successfully recruit some really bright young developers and, I hope, kickstarted some incredible careers for them. Granted, I’m not confident I could do it now, as the gap between what the company could afford and what you can make working remote is much too large now!