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Google Employees Explain How They Were Retaliated Against for Reporting Abuse

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Re: Google Employees Explain How They Were Retaliated Against for Reporting Abuse

#81

This boycott and these comments are being orchestrated by [redacted]. [redacted] is a transexual activist, and an offender in sexual harassment themselves. I'm posting this on a throwaway for obvious reasons. I worked at Google from 2010-2014. Over the summer of 2012 or 2013, I joined an Eve Online "Corporation" (guild) with [redacted], and another one of my coworkers. It was a crazy place. [redacted] had a fanatical…

I'm sorry for what happened to you and it is horrible. There are no excuses for said behavior. Some of the events sound possibly criminal and should be reported to the authorities.

That said, and especially since you end your statement with "I do not have any direct evidence of wrongdoing by [name]", I think it is unfair to name and shame here without evidence. You should remove the name from the story.

Re: Google Employees Explain How They Were Retaliated Against for Reporting Abuse

#82
post #67

I don't really know what anyone* can do to address some of these, as unacceptable as the occurrence of these stories are. Reading through the document (linked to by SolaceQuantum), there's one case where someone felt unprotected by HR because they asked HR not to investigate and HR did, and claimed to have fired the person for other HR problems. I'm not sure what HR should have done there. Are they supposed to not at…

That's a complaint from someone who doesn't understand the function of HR. HR isn't there to protect the employee. They are there to protect the company while giving the impression they are there for the employees. Sometimes that means they protect both at the same time. It always means they operate in the company's interests, sometimes to the detriment of an employee or employees. A lot of what I hear about google s…

Having served in the military, this rings extremely true to me. Most individual traits are eliminated with hair cut and uniform requirements, but anything left is seized upon with extra vigor.

This is demonstrated aptly against women. Men blame both failure and success of women on their gender. And the reality? Do women hide in their separated berthings and screen calls for each other? You bet. Do women get promoted because theyre more flirtatious and more easy to get along with? Duh. People that bitch about the above like to focus on those 6 problem women and forget theres 50 men you can barely count on to piss on a fire. Side story: I knew a salty submarine (100% male until ~5 years ago in US) male master chief that summed women in the navy perfectly: women are people; some good, some bad, some in the middle, and if you treat them like sailors, they act like sailors.

Point is, non-professional discussion rarely belong in the workplace. Letting those go basically guarantees conflict.

Re: Google Employees Explain How They Were Retaliated Against for Reporting Abuse

#83

I realise I might get downvoted here because of an unpopular point of view, but some of these comments raise a few flags: “I reported it up to where my manager knew, my director knew, the coworker’s manager knew and our HR representative knew. Nothing happened. I was warned that things will get very serious if continued,” So EVERYONE knew and they still disagreed with their point of view. Warned them that accusations…

To add to what you are saying: I feel a lot of the accusations are generic and overly ambiguous and this can lead to multiple interpretations which hurts everyone. For example: “I witnessed first hand (and was told second-hand) of several situations where women were being belittled, insulted and ignored” This text mentions the accusation of 'belittled, insulted and ignored'. But what exactly happened? It COULD mean a…

> I've seen first hand other Latinos completely over-react and get defensive in situations which were completely uncalled for.

> Someone makes a joke about Mexican food and they feel 'belittled and insulted'. Then because they are so insanely sensitive and tend to take everything personally, other co workers ignore them. To me, that's the logical conclusion of what happens to people with a victim mentality. I'm Latino and feel they were wrong for being sensitive. Am I wrong too?

https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/10/02/different-worlds/ (read it!)

This is a personality difference. Who's wrong depends on the unknowable intentions of the different people you interact with. In a more practical sense, who's wrong depends on who gets better results from their interactional style. You seem to be saying that these other people are suffering penalties for their heightened sensitivity; on that analysis, you're right and they're wrong.

> Both of these are 'sexual harassment'. One of them would warrant a VERY strong response. The other... not so much so. I think some people when they read sexual harrasment think one extreme while others think the other. But this only leads to people talking over each other without understanding. Using words with specific and concrete definitions is necessary for communication.

> At some point in the last century, words related to victims and attacks became so open ended that it's really hard to understand what is being discussed.

These terms are intentionally vague for diplomatic, coalition-building purposes, in the same way that an important treaty between premodern Russia and China was drawn up in Latin, so that the treaty could avoid clearly stating anything that either side didn't want to see in there. Clear communication isn't the goal, it's something that people are actively trying to frustrate.

Compare this discussion from Mary Beard's SPQR:

>> The first word of the second book of Livy's History, which begins the story of Rome after the monarchy, is 'free'; and the words 'free' and 'freedom' are together repeated eight times in the first few lines alone. The idea that the Republic was founded on libertas rings loudly throughout Roman literature...

>> But how was Roman liberty to be defined? That was a controversial question for the next 800 years, through the Republic and into the one-man rule of the Roman Empire when political debate often turned on how far libertas could ever be compatible with autocracy. Whose liberty was at stake? How was it most effectively defended? How could conflicting version of the freedom of the Roman citizen be resolved?

>> All, or most, Romans would have counted themselves as upholders of libertas, just as today most of us uphold 'democracy'. But there were repeated and intense conflicts over what that meant.

Re: Google Employees Explain How They Were Retaliated Against for Reporting Abuse

#84
post #67

I don't really know what anyone* can do to address some of these, as unacceptable as the occurrence of these stories are. Reading through the document (linked to by SolaceQuantum), there's one case where someone felt unprotected by HR because they asked HR not to investigate and HR did, and claimed to have fired the person for other HR problems. I'm not sure what HR should have done there. Are they supposed to not at…

That's a complaint from someone who doesn't understand the function of HR. HR isn't there to protect the employee. They are there to protect the company while giving the impression they are there for the employees. Sometimes that means they protect both at the same time. It always means they operate in the company's interests, sometimes to the detriment of an employee or employees. A lot of what I hear about google s…

> HR isn't there to protect the employee. They are there to protect the company while giving the impression they are there for the employees.

An overly broad generalisation. In situations where there's a direct conflict between the needs of the company and the employee - yes, absolutely. But those are relatively rare, in my experience,

Re: Google Employees Explain How They Were Retaliated Against for Reporting Abuse

#85
post #37

Many of these sound like they come from junior members disillusioned with how things work. Things like my manager didn't listen to me so I feel belittled. I have the second most experience so he should have. The company then moved me to a different team and I wasn't second in command so I lost my leadership. Doesn't the manager pick the team? If you don't support his vision and want to use a different approach being…

That’s not what the article says: > “I witnessed first hand (and was told second-hand) of several situations where women were being belittled, insulted and ignored. As the person with the second-longest tenure on the team, I suggested in a few 1:1s that my manager confront some of these issues,” wrote another Googler. “Because of my advocacy I was removed from my tech lead position and moved to another team along wit…

We don't have the information necessary to determine whether the two events are correlated or coincidental.

Re: Google Employees Explain How They Were Retaliated Against for Reporting Abuse

#87
post #37

Many of these sound like they come from junior members disillusioned with how things work. Things like my manager didn't listen to me so I feel belittled. I have the second most experience so he should have. The company then moved me to a different team and I wasn't second in command so I lost my leadership. Doesn't the manager pick the team? If you don't support his vision and want to use a different approach being…

That’s not what the article says: > “I witnessed first hand (and was told second-hand) of several situations where women were being belittled, insulted and ignored. As the person with the second-longest tenure on the team, I suggested in a few 1:1s that my manager confront some of these issues,” wrote another Googler. “Because of my advocacy I was removed from my tech lead position and moved to another team along wit…

It's only curious because we're selectively viewing the stories of the subset of people who protested or reported bad behavior and subsequently received poor ratings. The people who speak out and don't subsequently receive poor performance ratings or get moved to a different team are not displayed here. Thus it produces an illusion of causality.

Re: Google Employees Explain How They Were Retaliated Against for Reporting Abuse

#88
post #37

Many of these sound like they come from junior members disillusioned with how things work. Things like my manager didn't listen to me so I feel belittled. I have the second most experience so he should have. The company then moved me to a different team and I wasn't second in command so I lost my leadership. Doesn't the manager pick the team? If you don't support his vision and want to use a different approach being…

That’s not what the article says: > “I witnessed first hand (and was told second-hand) of several situations where women were being belittled, insulted and ignored. As the person with the second-longest tenure on the team, I suggested in a few 1:1s that my manager confront some of these issues,” wrote another Googler. “Because of my advocacy I was removed from my tech lead position and moved to another team along wit…

That makes perfect sense. How would you resolve the issue?

The most important role that person has is to support the leader and implement their ideas while providing leadership to the team. Advocacy for her own ideas and rallying the team behind them doesn't support this.

So google decides to move unhappy employee and friend to a team with a different vision . On the new team her she doesn't have the service level others do.

What would you have done? Move her to a new team with more junior members so she can still feel like a leader still? That project will be less important than the project she is on. Does that matter?

Maybe they wanted to put her on a team with stronger senior leadership to help guide her.

Should they have moved the manager on and made her manager?

When I see comments like: belittled, insulted and ignored

The manager heard how she wanted to do the project and gave reasons why. She did not accept his leadership and kept bring up her point of view. At first he answered them but tiring of being undermined he gave less importance to what she was saying until just ignoring her. She rallied others to go against the manager and used that in her complaint.

Google took the issue serious and said we need to move her and her friend to another team. If the manager has similiar issues in the future they may let him go. If she has similiar issues on her new team the same might apply.

Internally she may not be asked to join as many teams. And he will be watched closely. Lose-lose

Re: Google Employees Explain How They Were Retaliated Against for Reporting Abuse

#89
post #20

HR is not your friend and HR will never be your friend. In a post-2008 world, it baffles me that people still think that somewhere, deep-down, multi-billion dollar conglomerates have employees' best interests at heart. How quickly we forgot people losing their lifelong savings and entire pension funds going bust. Only to have the government bail out the exact same charlatans that dropped the ball in the first place.…

I completely agree. If I ever find myself in the situation of one of these stories, aka the victim, I will be going straight to an employment lawyer before HR to discuss my options. Hopefully meeting with HR with my lawyer present.

And your case would probably be dismissed before it ever gets off the ground. That’s if you can get an attorney to take it in the first place. You could have an ironclad case of whatever and if everyone shows up to court and it’s the first time the company is hearing about it, chances are the judge will throw it out. They generally have to be given an opportunity to respond before you can go kick their asses in court.

Re: Google Employees Explain How They Were Retaliated Against for Reporting Abuse

#90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you ever want to proceed with legal actions against the company then you have to put it into record somewhere which typically means reporting incidents to HR. Which ultimately leads to getting fired. What else are people supposed to do? It's a shitty unwinnable situation for employees, I've been on the shit end of this stick before at a different tech co for complaining and was retaliated against. It's not fun and…

> If you ever want to proceed with legal actions against the company then you have to put it into record somewhere which typically means reporting incidents to HR. This is not true. You don't have to record anything with HR for legal action. Its not a prerequisite by any means. Going to HR is always a wrong move. Get a lawyer.

> Going to HR is always a wrong move. Get a lawyer.

This is horrible advice. Going to HR is about leaving a paper trail, which is very important. No judge or arbitrator is going to give two hoots about i-said/they-said without (dated) documentation to back it up.

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