7 ms·

From the original memo: > Provide additional mental health support for Googlers of color — especially following critical moments impacting their communities

From the original memo: > Provide additional mental health support for Googlers of color — especially following critical moments impacting their communities > Throughout my time at Google, my mental health has been heavily influenced by what I read in the news. And in America, that means frequently reading about innocent black men and women who’ve been killed by police officers. Whether the issue is police brutality, or mass shootings targeting the LGBTQ community, or racist comments from the President debasing immigrants, Google needs to provide mental health support equitably, which means making a more concerted effort to create opportunities for underrepresented groups to seek counseling and support. With respect, I don't think this is an employer-based issue. Because this was caused by a non-work related source [the news], I think it should be the responsibility of the individual to seek therapy and other resources on their own time and on their own dime. Now if the employee was experiencing mental health issues as a direct result of coworkers or the work environment, then yes, the company should provide support. In fact, Google does provide free counseling for the staff who have to filter through illicit images on Google's search engine. Since those employees are regularly exposed to horrendous issues as part of their work, they get company-sponsored help with it.

GuiA 7y ago
> Now if the employee was experiencing mental health issues as a direct result of coworkers or the work environment Literally the opening quote: ”Over the last 5 years I’ve heard co-workers spew hateful words about immigrants, boast unabashedly about gentrifying neighborhoods, mockingly imitate people who speak different languages, reject candidates of color without evidence because of ‘fit.’”
- SamuelAdams 7y ago
  That's not what he's asking for, though. Here's his recommendation for change: > my mental health has been heavily influenced by what I read in the news. ...Google needs to provide mental health support... mak[e] a[n] ... effort to create opportunities ... to seek counseling and support. If he stated instead that his mental health was influenced by his coworkers hateful remarks, or rejecting candidates due to "fit", then yes, I would absolutely agree this is a great direction for Google to head towards. But that's not what the employee is asking for.
  - GuiA 7y ago
    The former employee used one particular story to describe things at the company that generally made them uncomfortable over the course of their 5 year tenure there, including their coworkers’ reaction to news events that affected them, and hiring practices that they perceived as biased (“reject candidates of color because of “fit””). The former employee then makes several suggestions, including rethinking hiring practices, providing more robust diversity training, and additional counseling/support for underrepresented employees. You can debate the validity/truthfulness you perceive in the employee’s account, you can debate whether you think the suggestions are good or not, but saying this isn’t an employer based issue seems like just putting your head in the sand.
hguant 7y ago
I think this request for more mental health support comes from Google's "we're everything to you" policy. Googlers here and elsewhere have compared Google to a college campus in many ways - "you go be smart and do your thing, and the Company will provide for you". Given than mentality/social compact, it's understandable that this employee would think asking for more mental health services would be ok.
- magduf 7y ago
  >have compared Google to a college campus in many ways - "you go be smart and do your thing, and the Company will provide for you" I guess this explains why many Google products seem to be pretty brilliant in many ways, but then have utterly glaring missing basic features or problems which never get fixed no matter how much users complain about them.
- eximius 7y ago
  I mean, I think that colleges are not responsible for the mental health of their students, at least to the degree it has been demanded the last few years - the whole 'safe space' concept has gotten out of control. The whole point of college is to learn and be exposed to new ideas, some of which will be uncomfortable and you're supposed to learn to deal with that. Colleges aren't completely indemnified from how students are exposed but the recent demands have been "don't expose me to things I'll disagree with".
ASinclair 7y ago
The company has a very generous mental health policy. 25 free counseling sessions a year. They're supposed to be for short term use. However, I heard a separate complaint that none of the available counselors were African American and thus wouldn't understand the employee's specific issue.
- lisper 7y ago
  As someone who has been through counseling, and with two immediate family members who are professional psychologists, I can tell you that "understanding someone's specific issue" doesn't matter nearly as much as one might think. People have this idea that the counseling process is analogous to a medical procedure: you go to the doctor, describe the problem, they diagnose you, and prescribe an intervention. That is not generally how it works. There is a little bit of that on occasion, but mostly counseling works simply through the process of rendering your feelings into words in the presence of another human being who is listening to you but in whom you are not emotionally invested and who is not emotionally invested in you. That, in and of itself, turns out to be tremendously helpful. (The same mechanism is in play in other kinds of human activities as well, like book clubs, writers groups, or religious gatherings.) You don't have to be black to learn how to provide this service to someone who is.
  - voxl 7y ago
    Nothing you said is relevant if the person will refuse council if they percieve it to be from someone who won't be able to understand their issues.
    - jldugger 7y ago
      But it is ironic that someone would seek therapy to cope with a racist world, and but refuse service based on the race of the therapist.
    - lisper 7y ago
      Well, sure, but that's on them. The belief that a counselor will not be able to help you, for whatever reason, will generally be a self-fulfilling prophecy. I see no salient difference between a black person deciding that a white person can't help them because they are white, and a white person deciding that a black person can't help them because they are black. To me, both of those positions are equally odious. One thing I've learned first-hand over the years is that you can't help someone who won't help themselves.
sandworm101 7y ago
Was reading the US news perhaps part of his job? Google runs one of the largest news machines. Hopefully someone in there is actually reading the stuff the machines collect and disseminate to users. I once had a boss that always talked guns. Every day he would go on about some politician's secret gun control agenda. The daily news wasn't part of the job until he made it so.
tryitnow 7y ago
Did you read the memo? The author describes a specific scenario where a co-worker brought up these issues as work. So, yes, it sounds like for this person it was work-related. However, I disagree with the author's recommendation to provide additional mental health support for people of color. I think employee affinity groups for employees of different cultures can be a good idea, but specifically targeting POC for "mental health" services? That's not a good precedent. Frankly, this memo is not well-written, my initial inclination was to dismiss aspects of it because I had a hard time following the reasoning, but once I read it a couple of times, I came around to agreeing about the diagnosis of the problem, but not all of the recommendations offered.
- StavrosK 7y ago
  "People talking about stuff" isn't work-related, work isn't making you talk with people about those events. It's just a side-effect of socialization.
  - rounce 7y ago
    In a professional environment, there need not be any kind of social element at all. Employees are there to get the job done, not hang-out and shoot the proverbial. There is nothing stopping people from going and grabbing lunch or a beer after work and discussing whatever they feel.
rhacker 7y ago
> Now if the employee was experiencing mental health issues as a direct result of coworkers or the work environment, then yes, the company should provide support. I think you kinda nailed there - he was placed in awkward situations where the other employees suddenly didn't have an opinion one way or another, whereas they had lots of opinions about ebola, etc... I'm wondering if therapy is even the correct word. It's more of a societal shield we all put up in various circumstances. Sometimes I try to imagine a world where women or men, other races, would swap places with someone from an actual conversation I had to help me reveal my own biases by trying to examine how things would go differently. We should be at a place where the conversation doesn't really change. For example let's say you're talking to your uncle about crime in the midwest. Suddenly swap them out for a black person from Minnesota. Is that conversation different now? Why? How do you internalize that so that when you speak you can speak to anyone. Another example - tradeshows. Sometimes I hear people talking about the customer like they are a wallet - now pretend that those people are suddenly talking TO the customer. Not only do we have the ability to see how messed up our own actions and language is, but you can now see it in other people. I'm not saying doing that kind of thing is going to fix all problems, but it is a very good thought exercise.
- commandlinefan 7y ago
  > Is that conversation different now? Well… yeah, but only because I’m going to be careful what I say to avoid stepping on somebody else’s feelings. To dance around the point just a bit - there are people who I can safely be completely honest with, and people who I cannot safely be completely honest with. I’m not sure I’m the one who needs to be doing the adjusting to change that.
- falcolas 7y ago
  Changing your conversations, or more importantly your opinions that you're willing to express based on the person in front of you - well that's just a normal trait that allows you to participate in society at large. A tame example: I don't talk about the latest in non-volitile memory advances with my friends that I play videogames with.
- ambicapter 7y ago
dessant 7y ago
It doesn't matter what is the source of an employee's health issue, the health insurance offered by the employer should cover everything. Though I can understand how some might see it differently after being prodded into place through corporate exploitation and the US healthcare system.
rexpop 7y ago
Typically, we hold only one full-time job, through which we acquire all the means of our subsistence. As other commenters have pointed out, this includes--crucially--our health insurance, from which we derive all of our health-needs. As such, it's the employers' exclusive responsibility to accommodate our health needs. We do not have adequate access, otherwise.
k__ 7y ago
Sounds like an US problem. In countries with universal health care private companies have nothing to do with health related problems.
- reitanqild 7y ago
  FWIW: Norway has very good universal bealth care and my employer still has health insurance that goes above and beyond that. Just mention to point out that companies can put an effort into this even if thwy don't have to.
- qzygr 7y ago
  In my country with universal health care if you ask for counseling you might get one free session after waiting for six months.
asabjorn 7y ago
Totally agree. Get off social media, shake the hands of your neighbor, and read a book instead of news. Your life will be better and you'll realize that it is not the end of life when someone disagrees with you.

GuiA 7y ago

> Now if the employee was experiencing mental health issues as a direct result of coworkers or the work environment Literally the opening quote: ”Over the last 5 years I’ve heard co-workers spew hateful words about immigrants, boast unabashedly about gentrifying neighborhoods, mockingly imitate people who speak different languages, reject candidates of color without evidence because of ‘fit.’”

SamuelAdams 7y ago
That's not what he's asking for, though. Here's his recommendation for change: > my mental health has been heavily influenced by what I read in the news. ...Google needs to provide mental health support... mak[e] a[n] ... effort to create opportunities ... to seek counseling and support. If he stated instead that his mental health was influenced by his coworkers hateful remarks, or rejecting candidates due to "fit", then yes, I would absolutely agree this is a great direction for Google to head towards. But that's not what the employee is asking for.
- GuiA 7y ago
  The former employee used one particular story to describe things at the company that generally made them uncomfortable over the course of their 5 year tenure there, including their coworkers’ reaction to news events that affected them, and hiring practices that they perceived as biased (“reject candidates of color because of “fit””). The former employee then makes several suggestions, including rethinking hiring practices, providing more robust diversity training, and additional counseling/support for underrepresented employees. You can debate the validity/truthfulness you perceive in the employee’s account, you can debate whether you think the suggestions are good or not, but saying this isn’t an employer based issue seems like just putting your head in the sand.

hguant 7y ago

I think this request for more mental health support comes from Google's "we're everything to you" policy. Googlers here and elsewhere have compared Google to a college campus in many ways - "you go be smart and do your thing, and the Company will provide for you". Given than mentality/social compact, it's understandable that this employee would think asking for more mental health services would be ok.

magduf 7y ago
>have compared Google to a college campus in many ways - "you go be smart and do your thing, and the Company will provide for you" I guess this explains why many Google products seem to be pretty brilliant in many ways, but then have utterly glaring missing basic features or problems which never get fixed no matter how much users complain about them.
eximius 7y ago
I mean, I think that colleges are not responsible for the mental health of their students, at least to the degree it has been demanded the last few years - the whole 'safe space' concept has gotten out of control. The whole point of college is to learn and be exposed to new ideas, some of which will be uncomfortable and you're supposed to learn to deal with that. Colleges aren't completely indemnified from how students are exposed but the recent demands have been "don't expose me to things I'll disagree with".

ASinclair 7y ago

The company has a very generous mental health policy. 25 free counseling sessions a year. They're supposed to be for short term use. However, I heard a separate complaint that none of the available counselors were African American and thus wouldn't understand the employee's specific issue.

lisper 7y ago
As someone who has been through counseling, and with two immediate family members who are professional psychologists, I can tell you that "understanding someone's specific issue" doesn't matter nearly as much as one might think. People have this idea that the counseling process is analogous to a medical procedure: you go to the doctor, describe the problem, they diagnose you, and prescribe an intervention. That is not generally how it works. There is a little bit of that on occasion, but mostly counseling works simply through the process of rendering your feelings into words in the presence of another human being who is listening to you but in whom you are not emotionally invested and who is not emotionally invested in you. That, in and of itself, turns out to be tremendously helpful. (The same mechanism is in play in other kinds of human activities as well, like book clubs, writers groups, or religious gatherings.) You don't have to be black to learn how to provide this service to someone who is.
- voxl 7y ago
  Nothing you said is relevant if the person will refuse council if they percieve it to be from someone who won't be able to understand their issues.
  - jldugger 7y ago
    But it is ironic that someone would seek therapy to cope with a racist world, and but refuse service based on the race of the therapist.
  - lisper 7y ago
    Well, sure, but that's on them. The belief that a counselor will not be able to help you, for whatever reason, will generally be a self-fulfilling prophecy. I see no salient difference between a black person deciding that a white person can't help them because they are white, and a white person deciding that a black person can't help them because they are black. To me, both of those positions are equally odious. One thing I've learned first-hand over the years is that you can't help someone who won't help themselves.

sandworm101 7y ago

Was reading the US news perhaps part of his job? Google runs one of the largest news machines. Hopefully someone in there is actually reading the stuff the machines collect and disseminate to users. I once had a boss that always talked guns. Every day he would go on about some politician's secret gun control agenda. The daily news wasn't part of the job until he made it so.

tryitnow 7y ago

Did you read the memo? The author describes a specific scenario where a co-worker brought up these issues as work. So, yes, it sounds like for this person it was work-related. However, I disagree with the author's recommendation to provide additional mental health support for people of color. I think employee affinity groups for employees of different cultures can be a good idea, but specifically targeting POC for "mental health" services? That's not a good precedent. Frankly, this memo is not well-written, my initial inclination was to dismiss aspects of it because I had a hard time following the reasoning, but once I read it a couple of times, I came around to agreeing about the diagnosis of the problem, but not all of the recommendations offered.

StavrosK 7y ago
"People talking about stuff" isn't work-related, work isn't making you talk with people about those events. It's just a side-effect of socialization.
- rounce 7y ago
  In a professional environment, there need not be any kind of social element at all. Employees are there to get the job done, not hang-out and shoot the proverbial. There is nothing stopping people from going and grabbing lunch or a beer after work and discussing whatever they feel.

rhacker 7y ago

> Now if the employee was experiencing mental health issues as a direct result of coworkers or the work environment, then yes, the company should provide support. I think you kinda nailed there - he was placed in awkward situations where the other employees suddenly didn't have an opinion one way or another, whereas they had lots of opinions about ebola, etc... I'm wondering if therapy is even the correct word. It's more of a societal shield we all put up in various circumstances. Sometimes I try to imagine a world where women or men, other races, would swap places with someone from an actual conversation I had to help me reveal my own biases by trying to examine how things would go differently. We should be at a place where the conversation doesn't really change. For example let's say you're talking to your uncle about crime in the midwest. Suddenly swap them out for a black person from Minnesota. Is that conversation different now? Why? How do you internalize that so that when you speak you can speak to anyone. Another example - tradeshows. Sometimes I hear people talking about the customer like they are a wallet - now pretend that those people are suddenly talking TO the customer. Not only do we have the ability to see how messed up our own actions and language is, but you can now see it in other people. I'm not saying doing that kind of thing is going to fix all problems, but it is a very good thought exercise.

commandlinefan 7y ago
> Is that conversation different now? Well… yeah, but only because I’m going to be careful what I say to avoid stepping on somebody else’s feelings. To dance around the point just a bit - there are people who I can safely be completely honest with, and people who I cannot safely be completely honest with. I’m not sure I’m the one who needs to be doing the adjusting to change that.
falcolas 7y ago
Changing your conversations, or more importantly your opinions that you're willing to express based on the person in front of you - well that's just a normal trait that allows you to participate in society at large. A tame example: I don't talk about the latest in non-volitile memory advances with my friends that I play videogames with.
ambicapter 7y ago

dessant 7y ago

It doesn't matter what is the source of an employee's health issue, the health insurance offered by the employer should cover everything. Though I can understand how some might see it differently after being prodded into place through corporate exploitation and the US healthcare system.

rexpop 7y ago

Typically, we hold only one full-time job, through which we acquire all the means of our subsistence. As other commenters have pointed out, this includes--crucially--our health insurance, from which we derive all of our health-needs. As such, it's the employers' exclusive responsibility to accommodate our health needs. We do not have adequate access, otherwise.

k__ 7y ago

Sounds like an US problem. In countries with universal health care private companies have nothing to do with health related problems.

reitanqild 7y ago
FWIW: Norway has very good universal bealth care and my employer still has health insurance that goes above and beyond that. Just mention to point out that companies can put an effort into this even if thwy don't have to.
qzygr 7y ago
In my country with universal health care if you ask for counseling you might get one free session after waiting for six months.

asabjorn 7y ago

Totally agree. Get off social media, shake the hands of your neighbor, and read a book instead of news. Your life will be better and you'll realize that it is not the end of life when someone disagrees with you.