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Google Employee Alleges Discrimination Against Pregnant Women in Viral Memo

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Re: Google Employee Alleges Discrimination Against Pregnant Women in Viral Memo

#21

Post by rosser »

MegaButts wrote: post #9
TAForObvReasons wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HR exists to protect the company, full stop. They are only interested in the workers insofar as they reveal potential legal liabilities for the company. It is almost always better to first talk to outside legal representation to understand the landscape. If there are actual law violations, they will help properly document and possibly start preparing a case, and if not then you know you should prepare to leave the co…

> It is almost always better to first talk to outside legal representation to understand the landscape. If there are actual law violations, they will help properly document and possibly start preparing a case, and if not then you know you should prepare to leave the company. Assuming you have already agreed to legally binding arbitration as is pretty much standard in all employee contracts (although thankfully a rece…

> how useful is it to go to a lawyer?

If nothing else, an informed, independent perspective should be able to help you better understand your situation, or see/know to ask about factors which you might not.

Re: Google Employee Alleges Discrimination Against Pregnant Women in Viral Memo

#22

Post by CoolGuySteve »

Osiris wrote: post #4

I've spent most entire career at relatively small companies (25-100 employees). I've never seen these types of issues (I can't say they've never happened, I'm just not aware of any). In fact, reading these stories is probably why I've never had the desire to apply to work at any of the large tech companies. I can't say for certain what the differences are, but I think smaller companies tend of have less office politi…

It happened to me at Tudor Investment in NYC, which only has about 200 employees. I tried to quit when my daughter was born as I had found a better job anyways.

If I didn't stay an extra 3 months, my manager threatened to fire me 'with cause' so they could enforce my non-compete without paying me in New York.

So there I was working through some of the most incompetent shit from my dismal colleagues while my wife was trying to take care of our newborn baby while she couldn't walk due to delivery complications.

A week before I was supposed to go he mailed me a 25 item list of tasks to do before he would 'allow' me to quit, so I terminated my employment. After which, they claimed my non-compete was in force without pay.

Don't ever work for those fucking vultures at Tudor Investment.

Re: Google Employee Alleges Discrimination Against Pregnant Women in Viral Memo

#23

Post by jedberg »

hundt wrote: post #6

I'm wondering, does anyone have any stories of involving HR in a situation like this (less-than-overt discrimination or harassment from a person more senior/important than you) and getting a positive outcome? At this point whenever I read that someone "reached out to HR to ask for help in navigating the situation" I assume that the main outcome will be to put the company on notice that they need to start working on t…

I don't know of any cases where the aggrieved person reported something to HR and was helped, but I know of a few cases where a third party reported something to HR on the aggrieved person's behalf and it turned out well.

I personally witnessed a woman at work getting harassed, and she was too afraid to say anything. I reported to HR on her behalf as a witness and the harasser was quickly removed.

I think the best way to get HR to help you is to find an ally and make them aware of the wrongdoing so they can be a witness and then report it to HR for you. Then it's no longer just the word of the two people involved, and they are more compelled to act to remove the liability of the aggressor.

Re: Google Employee Alleges Discrimination Against Pregnant Women in Viral Memo

#24

Post by not_a_cop75 »

Osiris wrote: post #4

I've spent most entire career at relatively small companies (25-100 employees). I've never seen these types of issues (I can't say they've never happened, I'm just not aware of any). In fact, reading these stories is probably why I've never had the desire to apply to work at any of the large tech companies. I can't say for certain what the differences are, but I think smaller companies tend of have less office politi…

I can voice the same. One company I started to work for stated a zero tolerance policy towards x,y,z. For me, that means even if I'm not guilty of x,y,z the accusation is enough to get me fired. I've seen enough investigations done to know that companies don't care if people are wrongly fired. They have enough valid reasons to let people go that they can always claim it was really one of those, even if it was not.

Re: Google Employee Alleges Discrimination Against Pregnant Women in Viral Memo

#27

Post by kevin_b_er »

TAForObvReasons wrote: post #16
MegaButts wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is almost always better to first talk to outside legal representation to understand the landscape. If there are actual law violations, they will help properly document and possibly start preparing a case, and if not then you know you should prepare to leave the company. Assuming you have already agreed to legally binding arbitration as is pretty much standard in all employee contracts (although thankfully a rece…

In many states that permit binding arbitration agreements, whistleblower protections and criminal activity reports pierce the agreement. That's why the specific nature of the transgression is important, and why actually talking to a lawyer is better.

It is the reverse. The state must not "permit" so much as aggressively work around mandatory binding arbitration, as the judiciary viciously denies access to courts of law to victims of mandatory binding arbitration and invalidates state laws to protect their citizenry. The American Arbitration Act has been interpreted with maximal denial of the rule of law towards its victims.

Re: Google Employee Alleges Discrimination Against Pregnant Women in Viral Memo

#28

Post by bubblewrap »

HarryHirsch wrote: post #25

So the author was managing a small team and was hold by her manager to get rid of one of her reports because she was pregnant. Now we know why management consists of psychopaths, those who are not evil quit in disgust.

That's what the pregnant woman claims. The manager could have disliked her for other reasons or considered her unfit for leading people for other reasons.

Re: Google Employee Alleges Discrimination Against Pregnant Women in Viral Memo

#30

Post by hcnews »

kyrra wrote: post #12
Osiris wrote: post #4

I've spent most entire career at relatively small companies (25-100 employees). I've never seen these types of issues (I can't say they've never happened, I'm just not aware of any). In fact, reading these stories is probably why I've never had the desire to apply to work at any of the large tech companies. I can't say for certain what the differences are, but I think smaller companies tend of have less office politi…

Google has ~100,000 employees at this point. This is the story of a single manager within the company. When you have that many people at the company, there are going to be people that make bad choices, and then the story will fall under the umbrella of "Google" and make the news. If this was a single small 25-100 person company, it would (likely) not get any notice.

How do you know if there are 1 or 100 or 1000s of such cases without actual data? Companies should be forced to reveal number of cases per year per geography. That'll allow me to make an informed choice when joining a company.

Also, its not clear to me why "HR will always help the company" has to be the status quo. This is an area where I would like the laws/judicial system to improve things.

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