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I’m always surprised by the level of employee activism at Google. I mean, it’s a job. You don’t like it, or the company, then the default thing people do is lea

I’m always surprised by the level of employee activism at Google. I mean, it’s a job. You don’t like it, or the company, then the default thing people do is leave. But based on my experience Google is different because they brainwash you into thinking that Google is the second coming of Christ and you don’t want to lose your front seat by just leaving. So instead of moving on, lots of frustrated employees burn out trying to change the company from within.

shadowgovt 7y ago
Google attracts quite a few people who, were they not doing industry, would be in academia. There tends to be a lot of philosophy of why things are done overlapped with what is done.
hknd 7y ago
It's actually with any company which gives you that much of freedome and voting power. And people hate it if something is being taken away.
clevergadget 7y ago
I assume that the culture of employee activism or at least advocacy being encouraged and fostered by internal systems of communication was probably part of the selling point for a lot of people to begin with. I agree with your premise though - Google established a different kind of relationship when they did the brainwashing/cultural indoctrination. This is the kind of genie that gets let out of a bottle when you do that and then you change up your culture after the fact.
fhennig 7y ago
I think that's not a bad thing. For big companies like that it is impossible to drive them out of the market with a competing company, so if you want to change it makes sense to do so from within. Especially since its such a powerful corporation they will always find people to replace the ones that leave, so your leaving doesn't actually help your cause all that much. Much better to stay inside and exert your power from within.
- mstade 7y ago
  > So instead of moving on, lots of frustrated employees burn out trying to change the company from within. (Quote from the post above yours, emphasis mine.) I read the post you're replying to as saying they didn't understand why people don't just go work somewhere else, rather than burn out with futile attempts at trying to change the corporation from within. Whether they are right or not I can't really speculate in, just thought it interesting that we seem to have had different takeaways from the comment.
- mcguire 7y ago
  Even if your power doesn't change anything?
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- nradov 7y ago
  How is it impossible? Plenty of big companies — including tech companies — have been driven out of the market by competitors.
macspoofing 7y ago
>I’m always surprised by the level of employee activism at Google. I'm not. Google encouraged it. Now they are forced to quash that culture because you can't run a multinational business that way. When profitability starts drying up in the ad business, you'll see a further shift.
- fishnchips 7y ago
  > Google encouraged it. Everyone's story is different but I joined in 2008 and it took me about a week to understand that the company did not want employees to get involved in a way that would affect day-to-day operations. As an example, you could organise an LGBT group, print out stickers and t-shirts, dance at the local Pride, take a few photos, and you'll get a pat on the back from HR. But if you asked for health benefits for your same-sex partner, that would be at least frowned upon. As a different example, you could organise Irish-speaking evenings, and again - pat on the back. But try to push for an Irish language version of Google interface, and you can get in trouble if you make enough noise that decision makers hear about it. Both of these are actual examples I saw first hand.
  - fishnchips 7y ago
    I suppose what I'm trying to argue here is that adult people with average emotional intelligence understand the difference between what's said and what's meant. So I find the argument that 'Google encouraged it' rather weak, especially for the insiders. The only thing I know is that leaving Google was back then one of the most difficult decisions of my life, despite being aware of conditioning I've been subjected to. Looking back, it was the best decision of my career, except that I should have left 2 years prior.
    - macspoofing 7y ago
      >adult people with average emotional intelligence understand the difference between what's said and what's meant. The problem with not defining boundaries and instead relying on some fuzzy notion of understanding the subtext is that it leads to confusion. The James Damore fiasco demonstrates this. They guy actually thought he could write an opinion on a highly controversial and inflammatory topic without repercussions. Why did he think that? The vast majority of HR departments would explicitly discourage it and the company culture (especially at a multinational) would make it clear this isn't a topic for the corporate intranet. But he was confused enough that he thought this was ok because he probably though Google is different and is OK with employees debating political and social positions on company boards. That's what I mean by 'Google encouraged it'.
ForHackernews 7y ago
The impression I have (as an outsider) is that Google is a totalitarian institution, in the same way universities are for undergraduates: it encourages employees to centre their entire lives around Google. They provide employment, food, transportation, leisure activities, social validation; in some cases housing. It's no wonder employees (especially young ones fresh from the bosom of Mother Academe) who have their entire sense of self wrapped up in being a Googler are hesitant to just walk away from that.
- gtfratteus 7y ago
  So Google is a totalitarian institution because they give out a lot of perks? Freedom is Slavery.
- thatfrenchguy 7y ago
  That’s true for a lot of tech companies: the goal is to make sure you spend all of your time thinking about work.
- philwelch 7y ago
  I think the term is “total institution”—a totalitarian institution wouldn’t actually tolerate factionalism and infighting.
dunkelheit 7y ago
You say you are surprised but then provide a perfectly good explanation in the next sentences of your comment. It is not much different from nation-states indoctrinating their citizens to "love their country". Moreover, some degree of indoctrination seems essential for any large-scale organization. They simply begin to collapse without it.
non_sequitur 7y ago
This is fairly cynical but i think it's one consequence of the economic boom. During recessions and recovery aftermath there are rarely issues like this, people are generally grateful for their jobs, not looking to pick fights over it. Not saying that is a better situation since it enables more corporations to exploit their employees, but the pendulum has swung pretty far the other way. Will be interesting to see what happens next recession.
UI_at_80x24 7y ago
I've always likened it to the early days of computing when it was "Big Blue" vs everybody. Small upstarts like Apple were very much the Hippy compared to the Button-Down Square. That Hippy rebel spirit is/was very much an identifying characteristic of `Silicon Valley`. I'd even say that Google is the poster child of Silicon Valley v2.0, and the people that work there might even resent the inevitable conservative slide that makes Google in 2019 look more like IBM in 1989. I know I resent that.
- chrisco255 7y ago
  I suspect "corporatist" might be a better term than conservative.
Ididntdothis 7y ago
“So instead of moving on, lots of frustrated employees burn out trying to change the company from within.” I think the mindset of changing of something from within is actually a good one. “Moving on” is probably easier and pragmatic but as a society it’s better to change things instead of just tossing them aside and going to the next thing. I hope the same people will also be active in politics and try to change things.
- dmix 7y ago
  Leaving while making it clear to your higher ups and coworkers that it's due to the dying work culture is not leaving without anything. Individual employees shouldn't have to make personal sacrifices, especially for a megacorp, beyond what they contribute each day as an employee. Unless they are an executive or management and get paid (and mandated) sufficiently to do culture stuff. There are people at Google who have this responsibility and are either failing, or possibly it's not really that bad and the news is overhyping a bunch of highly vocal individuals/small groups, while most Googlers are apolitical and happy with the group of people they work with. It's always hard to tell but most companies aren't getting multiple articles a year written about their culture.
  - wayoutthere 7y ago
    > Leaving while making it clear to your higher ups and coworkers that it's due to the dying work culture is not leaving without anything. The company does not care about you. Your boss does not care about you. Managers learn to stop being emotionally invested in their employees because everyone is replaceable and everyone leaves. The company is fine with the dying work culture as long as the money keeps rolling in. Things will not get better from the efforts of employees below the Senior Vice President level. And probably not even then without that person spending all their political capital. I struggled with this at a job where I was systematically marginalized but tried to "change things from within". After I realized that nobody was going to help me and it was what was burning me out, I lawyered up and negotiated an exit. The only way to change the culture is to make having a shitty work culture expensive.
TuringNYC 7y ago
>> I’m always surprised by the level of employee activism at Google. I mean, it’s a job. You don’t like it, or the company, then the default thing people do is leave. But based on my experience Google is different because they brainwash you into thinking that Google is the second coming of Christ and you don’t want to lose your front seat by just leaving. So instead of moving on, lots of frustrated employees burn out trying to change the company from within. How much of that is simply due to vesting schedules? Not just for Google, but broadly in tech, that doesn't quite work. If you jet, you lose un-vested equity. Oh, and you are also forced, in many cases, to spend a boatload of current cash to exercise vested options and get stuck with illiquid holdings for 5 or more years.
- kmonsen 7y ago
  This is not true at Google, you can trade all your vested equity ave the not vested ones should be replaced by a similar amount in your next job. Google pays pretty well which makes it hard to leave, ave there is a lot of nice people to work with.
  - TuringNYC 7y ago
    >> equity ave the not vested ones should be replaced by a similar amount in your next job. If you are in the money, you're losing a LOT of money when you leave, join a new company, and get struck new equity at a higher strike.
    - ElonMuskrat 7y ago
      You can ask the new company to match your unvested equity at current market value.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
- Analemma_ 7y ago
  Google (and most large established tech companies) give RSUs instead of options, so you don’t have to spend any money to exercise them, but your point about vesting is good.
overthemoon 7y ago
Not a googler myself, but if I had to guess I'd say they feel a sense of ownership in Google employees at other companies might not. I think that sense of ownership is warranted, if not in a strictly legal sense. If a Google employee feels that, it seems natural to want to see it change for the better, and stick around to help influence it to do so. Moreover, the sheer size and power of Google means that changing its culture changes how it interacts with the world, which could have far-reaching consequences. Seems natural to want to see that impact improve.
SkyPuncher 7y ago
Typically, I'd agree. However, I think leaving isn't a great option for a lot of FAANG employees. They have two options: 1. Maintain high pay at another FAANG. Depending on perspective, at least one of those is no better than Google. 2. Take a significant pay cut to work somewhere else.
compiler-guy 7y ago
There is also the money. Truckloads and truckloads of money.
gfs78 7y ago
Probably the result of years of social engineering played upon the protesters. They fail to see Google is not their friend. But also fail to see that the part they play as Google employees is not that important either.
Ar-Curunir 7y ago
I mean, worker organization is never a bad thing. Just like democracy is good for decision-making in government, it's also good for decision-making in the institution that dominates most employees' lives: their employer.
tanilama 7y ago
Maybe Google pays well and the work-life balance is great so the employees can enjoy a good life while spend most of their energy protesting, so much so they don't want to leave what they are protesting against /s
Bartweiss 7y ago
I see a very different explanation which could also explain this pattern. Employee activism doesn't make the news that often, but it's actually pretty common - as long as the activism doesn't challenge any core element of the business. If you want your call center to be more ecofriendly or your consulting firm to support Fight For $15, you may or may not get support but you probably won't see consequences. In tech itself, I've watched plenty of people push for green policies, or organize donations to support immigrants, or even recruit for the DSA with no issues at all. But they were recruiting for border reforms and political groups, not workplace unions and H-1B liberalization - and certainly not user privacy. When it comes to the Kickstarter union or Wayfair stopping sales to the CBP, the accommodation dries up fast. That doesn't mean the activism is insincere, or even about not making waves: there's also a powerful selection effect invovled. If you're passionate about the environment, you probably don't take a job at Shell, or you quit in protest. But if you're passionate about LGBT issues, there's much more reason to be optimistic about workplace activism, and it's mcuh easier to reconcile keeping your job while you do it. So what's up with Google? They used to do one thing in one way, then branched out rapidly, so they have lots of employees who bypassed the normal selection effects. And now they do everything, so every issue is simultaneously non-central to Alphabet as a whole and a direct challenge to some component of it. We haven't heard much about Google employees protesting search ranking algorithms or advocating for GDPR, because that's been selected against from the beginning. But AI, military work, internal transparency, and even corporate hierarchy are comparatively new issues for Google. The people who object aren't gone yet, and nobody can tell what's fundamental and what's safe to challenge.
paul7986 7y ago
I think it's because Google started and sold itself as the Do No Evil company that inspired 1,000s to more to get into tech; aspire to want to work for or with such a company. In the end we learn Google does evil for the sake of profits and many those who they inspired have become disenchanted.
bduerst 7y ago
This week Bezos said he wants to hire missionaries, not mercenaries, at Amazon. Nurturing a work culture of employees who care and are passionate has always been a goal for many companies.
d1zzy 7y ago
Yeah it does feel overwhelming. I'm actually starting to think that some of this may be targeted. Meaning that actively political people (of any political affiliation) are actively looking to get hired at Google and stir shit up. One way to confirm this theory is to get the the seniority of people that start these internal movements/arguments/threads/etc.
- thundergolfer 7y ago
  The 4 people recently fired that were labour activists had tenure of 11, 8, 4, and 1 years. I think it’s honestly ridiculous to suggest people are trying to get hired into Google to be political activists. We have no evidence of this and I’d need a lot to start believing it.
uoaei 7y ago
When your hiring process encourages critical thinkers, don't be surprised when they become critics.
- LIV2 7y ago
  The kinda critical thinking that makes them think working for China to throw people in deathcamps is good but working with the US government is bad?
throwawaysea 7y ago
Most employees working at companies (even Google) are seeking to just get their work done, be productive, draw a paycheck, and get some friendly socialization done along the way. It isn't a setting where they are seeking to fight political battles, argue about moral values, generate anxiety, be subject to leaks/doxxing, etc. But that's the exact environment created at places like Google where employee activism isn't shut down. Effectively, a minority of these employees are using company time/resources to engage in personal activities. Often those employees are highly-vocal, cutthroat about shutting down others' differing views, and the voices of others who are just trying to get things done are not represented. I think the lack of an anonymous channel for others to push back is a big problem because there is no psychological safety afforded to the majority of employees. Put another way, employee activism is an unscientific popularity contest where most people don't want to participate in the contest.
cameronbrown 7y ago
> they brainwash you into thinking that Google is the second coming of Christ Never once have I heard anyone describe Google in such high regard while working there. We're encouraged to be autonomous, self aware, thinking people, believe it or not. There are many things I agree and disagree with that Google does and expressing that is perfectly fine.

shadowgovt 7y ago

Google attracts quite a few people who, were they not doing industry, would be in academia. There tends to be a lot of philosophy of why things are done overlapped with what is done.

hknd 7y ago

It's actually with any company which gives you that much of freedome and voting power. And people hate it if something is being taken away.

clevergadget 7y ago

I assume that the culture of employee activism or at least advocacy being encouraged and fostered by internal systems of communication was probably part of the selling point for a lot of people to begin with. I agree with your premise though - Google established a different kind of relationship when they did the brainwashing/cultural indoctrination. This is the kind of genie that gets let out of a bottle when you do that and then you change up your culture after the fact.

fhennig 7y ago

I think that's not a bad thing. For big companies like that it is impossible to drive them out of the market with a competing company, so if you want to change it makes sense to do so from within. Especially since its such a powerful corporation they will always find people to replace the ones that leave, so your leaving doesn't actually help your cause all that much. Much better to stay inside and exert your power from within.

mstade 7y ago
> So instead of moving on, lots of frustrated employees burn out trying to change the company from within. (Quote from the post above yours, emphasis mine.) I read the post you're replying to as saying they didn't understand why people don't just go work somewhere else, rather than burn out with futile attempts at trying to change the corporation from within. Whether they are right or not I can't really speculate in, just thought it interesting that we seem to have had different takeaways from the comment.
mcguire 7y ago
Even if your power doesn't change anything?
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
nradov 7y ago
How is it impossible? Plenty of big companies — including tech companies — have been driven out of the market by competitors.

macspoofing 7y ago

>I’m always surprised by the level of employee activism at Google. I'm not. Google encouraged it. Now they are forced to quash that culture because you can't run a multinational business that way. When profitability starts drying up in the ad business, you'll see a further shift.

fishnchips 7y ago
> Google encouraged it. Everyone's story is different but I joined in 2008 and it took me about a week to understand that the company did not want employees to get involved in a way that would affect day-to-day operations. As an example, you could organise an LGBT group, print out stickers and t-shirts, dance at the local Pride, take a few photos, and you'll get a pat on the back from HR. But if you asked for health benefits for your same-sex partner, that would be at least frowned upon. As a different example, you could organise Irish-speaking evenings, and again - pat on the back. But try to push for an Irish language version of Google interface, and you can get in trouble if you make enough noise that decision makers hear about it. Both of these are actual examples I saw first hand.
- fishnchips 7y ago
  I suppose what I'm trying to argue here is that adult people with average emotional intelligence understand the difference between what's said and what's meant. So I find the argument that 'Google encouraged it' rather weak, especially for the insiders. The only thing I know is that leaving Google was back then one of the most difficult decisions of my life, despite being aware of conditioning I've been subjected to. Looking back, it was the best decision of my career, except that I should have left 2 years prior.
  - macspoofing 7y ago
    >adult people with average emotional intelligence understand the difference between what's said and what's meant. The problem with not defining boundaries and instead relying on some fuzzy notion of understanding the subtext is that it leads to confusion. The James Damore fiasco demonstrates this. They guy actually thought he could write an opinion on a highly controversial and inflammatory topic without repercussions. Why did he think that? The vast majority of HR departments would explicitly discourage it and the company culture (especially at a multinational) would make it clear this isn't a topic for the corporate intranet. But he was confused enough that he thought this was ok because he probably though Google is different and is OK with employees debating political and social positions on company boards. That's what I mean by 'Google encouraged it'.

ForHackernews 7y ago

The impression I have (as an outsider) is that Google is a totalitarian institution, in the same way universities are for undergraduates: it encourages employees to centre their entire lives around Google. They provide employment, food, transportation, leisure activities, social validation; in some cases housing. It's no wonder employees (especially young ones fresh from the bosom of Mother Academe) who have their entire sense of self wrapped up in being a Googler are hesitant to just walk away from that.

gtfratteus 7y ago
So Google is a totalitarian institution because they give out a lot of perks? Freedom is Slavery.
thatfrenchguy 7y ago
That’s true for a lot of tech companies: the goal is to make sure you spend all of your time thinking about work.
philwelch 7y ago
I think the term is “total institution”—a totalitarian institution wouldn’t actually tolerate factionalism and infighting.

dunkelheit 7y ago

You say you are surprised but then provide a perfectly good explanation in the next sentences of your comment. It is not much different from nation-states indoctrinating their citizens to "love their country". Moreover, some degree of indoctrination seems essential for any large-scale organization. They simply begin to collapse without it.

non_sequitur 7y ago

This is fairly cynical but i think it's one consequence of the economic boom. During recessions and recovery aftermath there are rarely issues like this, people are generally grateful for their jobs, not looking to pick fights over it. Not saying that is a better situation since it enables more corporations to exploit their employees, but the pendulum has swung pretty far the other way. Will be interesting to see what happens next recession.

UI_at_80x24 7y ago

I've always likened it to the early days of computing when it was "Big Blue" vs everybody. Small upstarts like Apple were very much the Hippy compared to the Button-Down Square. That Hippy rebel spirit is/was very much an identifying characteristic of `Silicon Valley`. I'd even say that Google is the poster child of Silicon Valley v2.0, and the people that work there might even resent the inevitable conservative slide that makes Google in 2019 look more like IBM in 1989. I know I resent that.

chrisco255 7y ago
I suspect "corporatist" might be a better term than conservative.

Ididntdothis 7y ago

“So instead of moving on, lots of frustrated employees burn out trying to change the company from within.” I think the mindset of changing of something from within is actually a good one. “Moving on” is probably easier and pragmatic but as a society it’s better to change things instead of just tossing them aside and going to the next thing. I hope the same people will also be active in politics and try to change things.

dmix 7y ago
Leaving while making it clear to your higher ups and coworkers that it's due to the dying work culture is not leaving without anything. Individual employees shouldn't have to make personal sacrifices, especially for a megacorp, beyond what they contribute each day as an employee. Unless they are an executive or management and get paid (and mandated) sufficiently to do culture stuff. There are people at Google who have this responsibility and are either failing, or possibly it's not really that bad and the news is overhyping a bunch of highly vocal individuals/small groups, while most Googlers are apolitical and happy with the group of people they work with. It's always hard to tell but most companies aren't getting multiple articles a year written about their culture.
- wayoutthere 7y ago
  > Leaving while making it clear to your higher ups and coworkers that it's due to the dying work culture is not leaving without anything. The company does not care about you. Your boss does not care about you. Managers learn to stop being emotionally invested in their employees because everyone is replaceable and everyone leaves. The company is fine with the dying work culture as long as the money keeps rolling in. Things will not get better from the efforts of employees below the Senior Vice President level. And probably not even then without that person spending all their political capital. I struggled with this at a job where I was systematically marginalized but tried to "change things from within". After I realized that nobody was going to help me and it was what was burning me out, I lawyered up and negotiated an exit. The only way to change the culture is to make having a shitty work culture expensive.

TuringNYC 7y ago

>> I’m always surprised by the level of employee activism at Google. I mean, it’s a job. You don’t like it, or the company, then the default thing people do is leave. But based on my experience Google is different because they brainwash you into thinking that Google is the second coming of Christ and you don’t want to lose your front seat by just leaving. So instead of moving on, lots of frustrated employees burn out trying to change the company from within. How much of that is simply due to vesting schedules? Not just for Google, but broadly in tech, that doesn't quite work. If you jet, you lose un-vested equity. Oh, and you are also forced, in many cases, to spend a boatload of current cash to exercise vested options and get stuck with illiquid holdings for 5 or more years.

kmonsen 7y ago
This is not true at Google, you can trade all your vested equity ave the not vested ones should be replaced by a similar amount in your next job. Google pays pretty well which makes it hard to leave, ave there is a lot of nice people to work with.
- TuringNYC 7y ago
  >> equity ave the not vested ones should be replaced by a similar amount in your next job. If you are in the money, you're losing a LOT of money when you leave, join a new company, and get struck new equity at a higher strike.
  - ElonMuskrat 7y ago
    You can ask the new company to match your unvested equity at current market value.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
Analemma_ 7y ago
Google (and most large established tech companies) give RSUs instead of options, so you don’t have to spend any money to exercise them, but your point about vesting is good.

overthemoon 7y ago

Not a googler myself, but if I had to guess I'd say they feel a sense of ownership in Google employees at other companies might not. I think that sense of ownership is warranted, if not in a strictly legal sense. If a Google employee feels that, it seems natural to want to see it change for the better, and stick around to help influence it to do so. Moreover, the sheer size and power of Google means that changing its culture changes how it interacts with the world, which could have far-reaching consequences. Seems natural to want to see that impact improve.

SkyPuncher 7y ago

Typically, I'd agree. However, I think leaving isn't a great option for a lot of FAANG employees. They have two options: 1. Maintain high pay at another FAANG. Depending on perspective, at least one of those is no better than Google. 2. Take a significant pay cut to work somewhere else.

compiler-guy 7y ago

There is also the money. Truckloads and truckloads of money.

gfs78 7y ago

Probably the result of years of social engineering played upon the protesters. They fail to see Google is not their friend. But also fail to see that the part they play as Google employees is not that important either.

Ar-Curunir 7y ago

I mean, worker organization is never a bad thing. Just like democracy is good for decision-making in government, it's also good for decision-making in the institution that dominates most employees' lives: their employer.

tanilama 7y ago

Maybe Google pays well and the work-life balance is great so the employees can enjoy a good life while spend most of their energy protesting, so much so they don't want to leave what they are protesting against /s

Bartweiss 7y ago

I see a very different explanation which could also explain this pattern. Employee activism doesn't make the news that often, but it's actually pretty common - as long as the activism doesn't challenge any core element of the business. If you want your call center to be more ecofriendly or your consulting firm to support Fight For $15, you may or may not get support but you probably won't see consequences. In tech itself, I've watched plenty of people push for green policies, or organize donations to support immigrants, or even recruit for the DSA with no issues at all. But they were recruiting for border reforms and political groups, not workplace unions and H-1B liberalization - and certainly not user privacy. When it comes to the Kickstarter union or Wayfair stopping sales to the CBP, the accommodation dries up fast. That doesn't mean the activism is insincere, or even about not making waves: there's also a powerful selection effect invovled. If you're passionate about the environment, you probably don't take a job at Shell, or you quit in protest. But if you're passionate about LGBT issues, there's much more reason to be optimistic about workplace activism, and it's mcuh easier to reconcile keeping your job while you do it. So what's up with Google? They used to do one thing in one way, then branched out rapidly, so they have lots of employees who bypassed the normal selection effects. And now they do everything, so every issue is simultaneously non-central to Alphabet as a whole and a direct challenge to some component of it. We haven't heard much about Google employees protesting search ranking algorithms or advocating for GDPR, because that's been selected against from the beginning. But AI, military work, internal transparency, and even corporate hierarchy are comparatively new issues for Google. The people who object aren't gone yet, and nobody can tell what's fundamental and what's safe to challenge.

paul7986 7y ago

I think it's because Google started and sold itself as the Do No Evil company that inspired 1,000s to more to get into tech; aspire to want to work for or with such a company. In the end we learn Google does evil for the sake of profits and many those who they inspired have become disenchanted.

bduerst 7y ago

This week Bezos said he wants to hire missionaries, not mercenaries, at Amazon. Nurturing a work culture of employees who care and are passionate has always been a goal for many companies.

d1zzy 7y ago

Yeah it does feel overwhelming. I'm actually starting to think that some of this may be targeted. Meaning that actively political people (of any political affiliation) are actively looking to get hired at Google and stir shit up. One way to confirm this theory is to get the the seniority of people that start these internal movements/arguments/threads/etc.

thundergolfer 7y ago
The 4 people recently fired that were labour activists had tenure of 11, 8, 4, and 1 years. I think it’s honestly ridiculous to suggest people are trying to get hired into Google to be political activists. We have no evidence of this and I’d need a lot to start believing it.

uoaei 7y ago

When your hiring process encourages critical thinkers, don't be surprised when they become critics.

LIV2 7y ago
The kinda critical thinking that makes them think working for China to throw people in deathcamps is good but working with the US government is bad?

throwawaysea 7y ago

Most employees working at companies (even Google) are seeking to just get their work done, be productive, draw a paycheck, and get some friendly socialization done along the way. It isn't a setting where they are seeking to fight political battles, argue about moral values, generate anxiety, be subject to leaks/doxxing, etc. But that's the exact environment created at places like Google where employee activism isn't shut down. Effectively, a minority of these employees are using company time/resources to engage in personal activities. Often those employees are highly-vocal, cutthroat about shutting down others' differing views, and the voices of others who are just trying to get things done are not represented. I think the lack of an anonymous channel for others to push back is a big problem because there is no psychological safety afforded to the majority of employees. Put another way, employee activism is an unscientific popularity contest where most people don't want to participate in the contest.

cameronbrown 7y ago

> they brainwash you into thinking that Google is the second coming of Christ Never once have I heard anyone describe Google in such high regard while working there. We're encouraged to be autonomous, self aware, thinking people, believe it or not. There are many things I agree and disagree with that Google does and expressing that is perfectly fine.