Woke Vs. Woke: Google Employees Upset over Company’s Layoffs

In an open letter to Google CEO Sundar Pichai, more than 1,400 Google employees called for better management of the company’s mass layoffs. The letter calls on Pichai and his management team to remember the company’s code of conduct, which reads, “don’t be evil.”

Business Insider reports that Google CEO Sundar Pichai informed his staff via email in January that the company would be laying off about 12,000 employees and that he accepted “full responsibility for the decisions that led us here.” In an open letter, Google workers assert that “nowhere has the voice of the workers been adequately considered, and we know that as workers we are stronger together than alone.”

The workers want Google to think about freezing new hires and giving laid-off workers priority for open positions. Additionally, they want the employer to permit workers to complete pre-planned leaves like parental and bereavement leave.

Employees who have been laid off have spoken out about their experiences since the layoffs were announced. One husband claimed he and his wife were in “disbelief” when they learned they had both lost their jobs. Another ex-Googler who was caring for his mother’s terminal illness claimed to have lost his job to Insider.