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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

#441

Post by wetmore »

dqv wrote: post #283
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…

You're right. It literally links to (what appears to be) an internal company document. go/nlrbnotice

Just because it's a go link doesn't make it an internal document. A go link is just a shortened url. You can make a go link point to a non-internal web page.

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

#442

Post by Vysero »

helen___keller wrote: post #265
cj wrote: post #5

> Kathryn Spiers, who worked as a security engineer, updated an internal Chrome browser extension so that each time Google employees visited the website of IRI Consultants — the Troy, Michigan, firm that Google hired this year amid a groundswell of labor activism at the company — they would see a pop-up message that read: “Googlers have the right to participate in protected concerted activities.” So basically, the Go…

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…

In my mind this is the hinge or the crux of the issue. If it was her job to create and inject JavaScript notifications of company policy and they fired her for doing that then shame on Google. Actually, it would be more than just shame on Google. If this is true, then I would say Google is not a safe place to work for anybody. Which is why I find it hard to believe that this was actually in her job description and or that there is more context that we are missing; that the premise of the argument is misleading.

"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."

-With regard to what exactly? Context matters, if the browser notifications she was creating were only supposed to pertain to surfing the web then I think we can safely say she overstepped her bounds.

"So when I heard that Google had hired a union busting firm and started illegally retaliating against my coworkers, I decided to make sure that my coworkers knew about the posting."

-Again, it depends on what exactly her job was, but this seems to suggest she had motivation outside the bounds of her job description for doing what she did.

I don’t disagree with what she did. In fact, I think it’s kind of great. However, that doesn’t mean Google didn’t have a right to fire her for it.

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

#443

Post by chance_state »

thinkingemote wrote: post #381
thu2111 wrote: post #364

I think a lot of people are missing the bigger picture here and are too zoomed in on the specific issue of unionisation. Google really had no choice here, and it's actually a problem for them that this is coming out now via a blog post by the fired employee and not by their own admission. Google is in a phenomenally trusted position in the world. Chrome is the most popular browser. It auto updates silently and contin…

She didn't weaponise a neutral extension. The extension was already weaponised. It already pushed notifications to users when they visited flagged URLs. She probably just changed a config file to add a new rule and message, 1 line.

>It already pushed notifications to users when they visited flagged URLs.

Did it push notifications with a particular political message? I don't think it did.

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

#444

Post by s1artibartfast »

helen___keller wrote: post #265
cj wrote: post #5

> Kathryn Spiers, who worked as a security engineer, updated an internal Chrome browser extension so that each time Google employees visited the website of IRI Consultants — the Troy, Michigan, firm that Google hired this year amid a groundswell of labor activism at the company — they would see a pop-up message that read: “Googlers have the right to participate in protected concerted activities.” So basically, the Go…

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…

>her job is literally to create javascript notifications of company policy,

I think there is a reasonable difference between security notifications and other corporate policies.

Were non-security notifications in scope for their job or the tool used?

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

#445

Post by gnopgnip »

kawfey wrote: post #78
iwantagrinder wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you not read the part where she did, where she followed the process by the book and it was approved? Or did you just have your mind made up to decide to side with Google instead?

If my company's handbook on privileged access is anything like Google's, it's completely against the rules to do something like this, even if it's for a noble or worthy cause for its employees, even if other employee's must sign off on the change. Our employee agreement comes with an NDA that tells us to not speak bad about the company, and insubordination of this has resulted in firings just from social media critic…

Its also against the rules to go on strike, but it would be unlawful to fire someone for striking in many cases

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

#446

Post by tanilama »

helen___keller wrote: post #265
cj wrote: post #5

> Kathryn Spiers, who worked as a security engineer, updated an internal Chrome browser extension so that each time Google employees visited the website of IRI Consultants — the Troy, Michigan, firm that Google hired this year amid a groundswell of labor activism at the company — they would see a pop-up message that read: “Googlers have the right to participate in protected concerted activities.” So basically, the Go…

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…

> 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

She needs to understand this power isn't her own to wield.

And the risk of people abusing power to advance their personal agenda is NOT something that would get passed easily once discovered.

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

#447

Post by quotemstr »

extropy wrote: post #230
raxxorrax wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they really fired her for just this bagatelle, it speaks more against Google. I don't know why there is this pervasive desire to strangle developers. This is a pretty recent phenomena in my opinion and certainly nothing close to a requirement to develop great software. If I were an employee at Google, actions such as this would let me seriously consider to look for other work. The requirement for the code review f…

Google needs to choose between two evils here: Give employees power / freedom and fire fast if you do stupid things. Stricter regulations/ checks so they cannot mess up hard in the first place. At the cost of slower pace and less risks taken. Google has historically been the former. And it comes with people doing stupid things and getting fired. Just the world is not used for huge companies to keep operating in such…

Google's open culture wasn't designed to be robust against internal activists trying to leak, spam political messages, and incite dissatisfaction everywhere. Google's open culture assumed good faith, and that's gone now.

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

#449

Post by qaq »

username90 wrote: post #426
qaq wrote: post #418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's extremely relevant I will reiterate I know literally 0 large companies where this would be tolerated from a security team member.

Google did tolerate exactly the same kind of behavior from the internal OS distribution team before, you could argue that security is even more important there than in a browser plugin.

I am not a Googler but I reiterate I know exactly 0 CSOs that would tolerate this. You providing an example outside of security team kindah reinforces my point.

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

#450

Post by dqv »

wetmore wrote: post #441
dqv wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right. It literally links to (what appears to be) an internal company document. go/nlrbnotice

Just because it's a go link doesn't make it an internal document. A go link is just a shortened url. You can make a go link point to a non-internal web page.

>It also included a link to a list of employee rights and protections that Google agreed to post as part of a settlement with the National Labor Relations Board this year.[0]

But in this case it appears to be a link to an internal notice.

[0]: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-12-17/another-g...

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