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I disagree. If my employee sends out a group email listing demands that must be met in order for them to stay with the company, unless those demands are incredi

I disagree. If my employee sends out a group email listing demands that must be met in order for them to stay with the company, unless those demands are incredibly reasonable, I'm firing them on the spot. What's the point in keeping someone that disgruntled around? They can only make things worse.

pr0zac 6y ago
I don't necessarily disagree with your point regarding letting a disgruntled employee go (and do agree with both grandparent that mentioning resignation was a dangerous negotiating tactic and parent that this seems like Google attempting to quickly revoke an unhappy employee's access to internal information that could paint them in a bad light) I do think its important to note that the email documenting her demands was only sent to her managers and wasn't a group email. Based on the responses to her tweets about this her team was blindsided by her being let go. Also important to the discussion is that her managers (and thus Google) appear to be framing this as "accepting her resignation" as opposed to firing her (tying into GP's point) which likely has consequences with regard to separation benefits and lets Google frame this as not being their decision (or at least would be if it weren't for Twitter/articles like this). It seems like Gebru did things correctly with regard to reporting her unhappiness to her management team but made the mistake of mentioning possible resignation in response to a lack of change which Google jumped on as a method to protect themselves by immediately removing a possibly disgruntled employee in a way that allows them to avoid the downsides of firing her (that simple description alone not meant to imply any judgment). Its a rather murky situation to untangle though when combined with Google's firing of employees participating in organization and other events over the last few years giving the general impression of Google "becoming evil" I does seem like the bad PR this will cause means Google's handling of the situation was a bad choice.

pr0zac 6y ago

I don't necessarily disagree with your point regarding letting a disgruntled employee go (and do agree with both grandparent that mentioning resignation was a dangerous negotiating tactic and parent that this seems like Google attempting to quickly revoke an unhappy employee's access to internal information that could paint them in a bad light) I do think its important to note that the email documenting her demands was only sent to her managers and wasn't a group email. Based on the responses to her tweets about this her team was blindsided by her being let go. Also important to the discussion is that her managers (and thus Google) appear to be framing this as "accepting her resignation" as opposed to firing her (tying into GP's point) which likely has consequences with regard to separation benefits and lets Google frame this as not being their decision (or at least would be if it weren't for Twitter/articles like this). It seems like Gebru did things correctly with regard to reporting her unhappiness to her management team but made the mistake of mentioning possible resignation in response to a lack of change which Google jumped on as a method to protect themselves by immediately removing a possibly disgruntled employee in a way that allows them to avoid the downsides of firing her (that simple description alone not meant to imply any judgment). Its a rather murky situation to untangle though when combined with Google's firing of employees participating in organization and other events over the last few years giving the general impression of Google "becoming evil" I does seem like the bad PR this will cause means Google's handling of the situation was a bad choice.