Google staff hit again at CEO over layoffs: ‘Nowhere have staff’ voices been adequately been thought-about’

In an open letter addressed to Chief Govt Officer Sundar Pichai, staff made a sequence of calls for of the corporate, together with freezing new hires, looking for voluntary redundancies earlier than obligatory ones, giving precedence to laid off staff for job vacancies and letting staff end scheduled durations of paid time without work, akin to parental and bereavement go away.

The employees additionally known as on Alphabet to keep away from terminating staff from international locations with lively conflicts or humanitarian crises, akin to Ukraine, and supply additional assist to these susceptible to shedding their visa-linked residency together with their jobs.

“The impacts of Alphabet’s determination to scale back its workforce are international,” the letter stated. “Nowhere have staff’ voices adequately been thought-about, and we all know that as staff we’re stronger collectively than alone.”

The petition follows Alphabet’s announcement in January that it could reduce about 6% of its workforce following investor strain to scale back spending within the post-pandemic hunch. Meta Platforms Inc., Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. are among the many different tech giants to slash headcount in latest months after years of progress and hiring.

A spokesperson for Alphabet didn’t instantly touch upon the petition. When Pichai introduced the job cuts on Jan. 20, he stated in an e-mail to workers that the corporate employed for a “completely different financial actuality than the one we face at present” and that he took “full duty.”

Though some Google staff, notably within the US, misplaced their jobs instantly, the method has been a lot slower for these in international locations with stronger labor protections which might be widespread in Europe. Googlers in Switzerland, for instance, solely realized which staff had been reduce this week, triggering a walkout on Wednesday.

The letter was organized by a gaggle of staff supported by unions together with the Alphabet Employees Union, United Tech and Allied Employees and UNI World. It was born out of discussions by way of a Discord channel arrange after the roles cuts had been introduced.

Labor teams have helped arrange a number of petitions concerning the layoffs at numerous Google models and in several international locations the place it’s current.

A number of the individuals who signed the petition instructed Bloomberg they’re involved that the session processes required by regulation in some international locations have turn out to be a box-ticking train. Suggestions from workers to administration, together with outcomes of surveys the place folks expressed curiosity in volunteering for redundancy or lowered hours, has not been taken under consideration, they stated.

The employees plan to flow into the petition for a number of extra days earlier than presenting a bodily copy to Pichai on the Google’s headquarters in California.