Business
Published January 19, 2024, 7:09 PM ET
Angry Googlers are tired of being nice.
Current and former employees of the tech giant took to LinkedIn to express their frustration with the way management has handled the recent wave of layoffs – with one software engineer calling bosses “lacking a single visionary leader.”
“From the C-suite to the SVPs to the VPs, they are all deeply boring and glassy-eyed,” Diane Hirsh Theriault wrote on her LinkedIn page Wednesday.
Theriault responded to the news that Google is laying off several hundred people from its ad sales team.
Last week, the company laid off around 1,000 employees from its Pixel, Fitbit and Nest divisions – a move that reportedly outraged employees, who were particularly upset that CEO Sundar Pichai didn't communicate directly with those affected.
On Thursday, Pichai told employees that more job cuts were expected this year, but he warned that they would not be on the same scale as a year ago.
“We have ambitious goals and will invest in our big priorities this year,” Pichai told all Google employees on Wednesday in an internal memo first obtained by The Verge.
“The reality is that we have to make difficult decisions to create the capacity for this investment.”
“Call me old-fashioned, but I think if you find yourself in a situation where you have to let someone go, you owe it to them to meet them face to face, look them in the eyes and acknowledge their humanity . “Kenneth Smith, a former engineering manager who was fired by Google, wrote on his LinkedIn account.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai warned this week that more job cuts are coming this year. AFP via Getty Images
Smith, who admitted that a supervisor reached out to him after news of the layoffs broke, wrote that he had “a lot of anger and frustration with Google's leadership for dealing with the layoffs” of 12,000 colleagues last year dealt with.
“I don’t see much evidence that they learned much from this experience,” he wrote.
Current and former Google employees took to social media to vent their frustration over management's handling of the latest round of layoffs. AP
Gergely Orosz, a software developer and technology commentator, responded to Smith's LinkedIn post on X, calling Google a “faceless company.”
“Google [is] “They are successfully cementing their reputation as the place where, after years of service, all you get is an email from the system saying you’re fired,” Orosz wrote on X.
“It's just a business. They can fire you at any time (and will if it is in the business interest) and you will do the same and leave at any time (if it is in your personal interest),” Orosz wrote, adding: “Forget 'loyalty' or 'commitment' in both directions.” .”
Last year, Google laid off about 12,000 employees as tech companies sought to cut costs in anticipation of an economic downturn.
At the time of the layoffs, the company employed nearly 187,000 people worldwide.
A company representative told Business Insider that it is “investing responsibly in our company's biggest priorities and significant future opportunities,” adding that the organizational changes included “some role eliminations globally.”
“We continue to support all affected employees as they seek new roles here at Google and beyond,” the Google representative said.
Shares of Google parent Alphabet Inc. rose more than 2% on Friday.
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