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Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

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Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#321

Post by helen___keller »

ramblerman wrote: post #300
helen___keller wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agreed with this at first, but according to her medium post ( https://medium.com/@ksspiers/google-fires-another-worker-for... ) "Part of my job was to write browser notifications so that my coworkers can be automatically notified of employee guidelines and company policies while they surf the web" If this is true and her job is literally to create javascript notifications of company policy, then I think it's entire…

Really? So if I hire you to email out my monthly company statement it’s reasonable that you add some of your own thoughts to said email.

It wasn't her thoughts it was company policy, or to be specific it's required by law that this notice to be posted in the workplace.

It's was her personal judgment that it should be posted in a chrome add-on rather than only by poster like is typical in most workplaces. But assuming her job was to maintain an add-on that informs employees of company policy, and assuming her job typically lets her act with personal judgment, yeah I think that's perfectly reasonable

In fact, you can find further support of her action from the NLRB FAQ:

https://www.nlrb.gov/resources/faq/elections/are-there-any-c...

"The employer is also required to distribute the notice electronically to unit employees if it customarily communicates with employees in the unit electronically, either by email, by posting on an employer intranet site, or both"

Again, it's her judgment to add the notification (which links to the Google intranet posting of the NLRB poster), but considering that Google customarily informs employees of policy via notifications in this add-on, and she is in charge of maintaining said add-on, it doesn't seem like an unreasonable judgment to add this notification

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#322

Post by KirinDave »

ramblerman wrote: post #300
helen___keller wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agreed with this at first, but according to her medium post ( https://medium.com/@ksspiers/google-fires-another-worker-for... ) "Part of my job was to write browser notifications so that my coworkers can be automatically notified of employee guidelines and company policies while they surf the web" If this is true and her job is literally to create javascript notifications of company policy, then I think it's entire…

Really? So if I hire you to email out my monthly company statement it’s reasonable that you add some of your own thoughts to said email.

If those thoughts are factual and relevant to the topic at hand, it... does seem like it's reasonable?

She's an engineer, not someone working a type pool.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#324

Post by CharlesColeman »

BoorishBears wrote: post #205
CharlesColeman wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IIRC, an employer has to make the content available in some form in a place where employees will see it, not just anywhere. Traditionally it's a wall display of posters in a cafeteria or break room. Trying to fulfill the requirement by putting the posters up in a broom closet of the CEO's office would be forbidden. I think the employee has a point with the pop-up. Wall posters aren't a good way to reach technology wo…

The idea of the popup isn't the issue I have with this. It's coopting an internal tool for political messages then implying "it passed PR" means you had permission from where it should come from. It's not even the message itself, I don't want politics, even those I agree with, living in the codebase I use at work. Sure the notice is required, but putting it so it shows up solely on the website for the legal firm hire…

> It's coopting an internal tool for political messages then implying "it passed PR" means you had permission from where it should come from.

No one's saying it "passed PR", it passed the review process that was in place for similar changes.

> IIRC, an employer has to make the content available in some form in a place where employees will see it, not just anywhere. Traditionally it's a wall display of posters in a cafeteria or break room. Trying to fulfill the requirement by putting the posters up in a broom closet of the CEO's office would be forbidden.

> It's not even the message itself, I don't want politics, even those I agree with, living in the codebase I use at work.

A lot of this thread feels like unusual sudden concern for the aesthetics of the cafeteria wall.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#325

Post by Cyph0n »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #40
Maxion wrote: post #20

Did no one read the article? > Spiers, 21, said she went through the standard approval process, which requires two co-workers to greenlight changes, before updating the Chrome browser extension. Another source at Google familiar with the update approval process confirmed to NBC news that those two approvals are standard practice for a browser extension update. She did it exactly according to internal policy. The exte…

That sounds like a code review, which is not the same as project/management approval for the 'feature' at all.

But it was not a "feature". It was a change to an extension that did exactly the same thing on other sites, so a code review makes absolute sense.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#326

Post by [deleted] »

jagged-chisel wrote: post #307
ramblerman wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? So if I hire you to email out my monthly company statement it’s reasonable that you add some of your own thoughts to said email.

I think GP is saying that since 'right to organize' is in the company policy, then adding this seems right in line with the job. If, indeed, this was not in the company policy, and it is indeed the employee's opinion, then yes, termination is apt.

[deleted]

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#327

Post by sdenton4 »

Frost1x wrote: post #252
Touche wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prefixing this by saying I am not siding with Google (since people make assumptions). The standard approval process sounds like most merge review processes on any engineering team. There's a sort of assumed good-faith for this process. The fact that 2 coworkers were fine with your change doesn't mean it was made in good-faith and was within the bounds of normal types of changes. Any engineer with the freedom to make…

I have to agree. I'm all for unionization in our industry to improve employee leverage and even more open compensation sharing to help drive comp up... but this is a step too far. Pushing your message in this fashion is clearly irresponsible no matter how "by-the-book" it is. With that said, the organization and orchestration problem for movements is a very real problem (finding the correct people and disseminating i…

It's an even harder problem when the employer is firing people for trying to organize.

Change the words in the message, and I can't imagine it being anything but a reprimand, at worst. This is a message to other employees that organizing gets you fired.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#328

Post by debt »

helen___keller wrote: post #233

From the engineer's medium post: > For example, someone changed the default desktop wallpaper during the walkout last year so that the Linux penguin was holding a protest sign. The company has never reacted aggressively in response to a notification such as this in the past. It’s always been a celebrated part of the culture. I suppose this was her mistake: ""It's always been a celebrated part of the culture" Google c…

It’s sort of ridiculous to think any boss would approve this, which is why she did it the way she did it in the first place.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#329

Post by C14L »

ramblerman wrote: post #300
helen___keller wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agreed with this at first, but according to her medium post ( https://medium.com/@ksspiers/google-fires-another-worker-for... ) "Part of my job was to write browser notifications so that my coworkers can be automatically notified of employee guidelines and company policies while they surf the web" If this is true and her job is literally to create javascript notifications of company policy, then I think it's entire…

Really? So if I hire you to email out my monthly company statement it’s reasonable that you add some of your own thoughts to said email.

Was she hired to only add things other people told her to add?

Or was she hired to add things she considered relevant?

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#330

Post by evan_ »

School-Cotton wrote: post #92
Maxion wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It feels like a lot of astro-turfing going on here. Why would any sane person be against unions?

I'm sane, and don't want to join a union (I'm not against them in general ; there are certainly fields where they make sense). I don't know if your question was serious, but in case it was: I don't feel like my employer is a rival or an enemy; I feel like they are a partner in our mutual goal to make a lot of money. I've never worked at Google, but I've worked at similarly famous large companies, making several times…

> I feel like they are a partner in our mutual goal to make a lot of money.

Your employer doesn’t feel that way.

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