{"id":14054,"date":"2018-11-04T10:08:38","date_gmt":"2018-11-04T15:08:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/?p=14054"},"modified":"2018-11-04T15:32:38","modified_gmt":"2018-11-04T20:32:38","slug":"googles-metoo-moment-workers-walk-out-over-womens-rights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/?p=14054","title":{"rendered":"Google’s ‘#metoo’ moment: Workers walk out over women’s rights"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

. . WOMEN’S EQUALITY . . <\/p>\n

An article by Jane Lanhee Lee and Paresh Dave in Thomson Reuters<\/a> (reprinted by permission)<\/p>\n

Thousands of Google employees around the world briefly walked off their jobs on Thursday [November 1] to protest the company\u2019s response to sexual harassment and demand that the world\u2019s largest search engine address rising concerns about workplace inequality.<\/p>\n

The protests took place in waves, beginning in Asia and then streaming across Europe and North America, with the final wave occurring at Google\u2019s headquarters in Mountain View, California.<\/p>\n

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The protests, which drew Google contract workers as well as employees, followed a New York Times report last week that Google in 2014 gave a $90 million exit package to a senior vice president, Andy Rubin, after he was accused of sexual harassment.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was the $90 million straw that broke the camel\u2019s back,\u201d Celie O\u2019Neil-Hart, one of the protest organizers and who works on YouTube marketing, told reporters as she joined hundreds of other employees in the courtyard of Google\u2019s Mountain View headquarters. \u201cBut there are so many stories that we\u2019ve heard for so long, and it\u2019s time for action and change,\u201d said O\u2019Neil-Hart as she teared up.<\/p>\n

Rubin denied the allegation in the New York Times story, which he said contained \u201cwild exaggerations\u201d about his compensation. Google did not dispute the report.<\/p>\n

Organizers said about 60 percent of Google\u2019s offices participated, including Dublin, the company\u2019s largest site outside the United States, as well as London, Zurich, Berlin and Singapore. They shared photographs on social media of hundreds leaving offices.<\/p>\n

Many employees at the Mountain View walkout chanted \u201cWomen\u2019s rights are workers rights,\u201d and some wore blue ribbons in support of sexual harassment victims.<\/p>\n

Seven U.S. employees who organized the demonstrations called on Google parent Alphabet Inc (GOOGL.O) to make harassment investigations fairer for accusers, share pay-equity data with workers and add an employee representative to its board.<\/p>\n

Google Chief Executive Sundar Pichai, speaking an hour later at a New York Times conference in New York, said he was taking note of the \u201cconcrete steps\u201d workers presented to improve the company\u2019s culture and human resources processes.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to make sure Google sets the bar,\u201d he said, noting that a lack of gender and racial diversity was part of the issue. \u201cWe\u2019re grappling with it, as with many places.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Article continued in the right column)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Question for this article<\/div>\n
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Protecting women and girls against violence, Is progress being made?<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

(Article continued from the left column)<\/p>\n

Organizers and other employees said Google executives, like leaders at the dozens of companies affected by the #metoo movement, have been slow to address numerous structural issues such as unchecked power of male executives.<\/p>\n

They want Google to publicly report its sexual harassment statistics and end forced arbitration in harassment cases. They also have asked that the chief diversity officer be able to directly advise the board.<\/p>\n

Rana Abdelhamid, who works in Google Cloud\u2019s marketing division in San Francisco, told reporters that the walkout was \u201cabout safety of women in the workplace,\u201d adding that Google\u2019s historical support for women\u2019s causes caused her to be shocked when she learned of the multi-million-dollar payout.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe numbers and facts don\u2019t match with the intentions\u201d of Google on equality and safety for underrepresented groups, she told Reuters. \u201cWe need to reprioritize energy and really focus on these issues.\u201d<\/p>\n

MONTHS OF BUILDUP<\/strong><\/p>\n

Since its founding two decades ago, Google has been known for its motto \u201cdon\u2019t be evil,\u201d a dictum preserved in its worker code of conduct, and its transparency with employees about corporate strategy.<\/p>\n

But employees have internally organized for months to increase diversity and improve treatment of women and minorities.<\/p>\n

Those issues have been top of mind since the 2016 election of U.S. President Donald Trump, a Republican, stunned Silicon Valley, where liberal and libertarian policies are popular.<\/p>\n

Tech workers have become more vocal to protest both the president\u2019s and their companies\u2019 stances on immigration, defense and discrimination. Workers have said that they are driven by the sense that their technology pioneer employers should also be standard bearers on socioeconomic issues.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe all know that the status quo is unacceptable and if there is any company who can solve this, it is Google,\u201d said Thomas Kneeland, a Google software engineer in New York.<\/p>\n

The dissatisfaction among Alphabet\u2019s 94,000 employees and tens of thousands contractors has not noticeably affected the company\u2019s share price. But employees, who warned they would demonstrate again if needed, expect Alphabet to face recruiting and retention challenges if their concerns go unaddressed.<\/p>\n

Alphabet shares closed down 0.4 percent to $1,085.98 on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Around the world, Google workers walked out carrying signs reading \u201cTime\u2019s up Tech,\u201d \u201cHappy to quit for $90M – no sexual harassment required\u201d and \u201cNot OK Google,\u201d a reference to the \u201cOK Google\u201d phrase used to activate Google\u2019s voice-operated Assistant.<\/p>\n

Cathay Bi, a Google product manager, speaking through a megaphone before hundreds gathered in a bustling pedestrian plaza in San Francisco\u2019s financial district, talked about the engines of change.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is what it means to be \u2018Googley,\u2019\u201d she urged the crowd to chant, invoking a widely used term for the company\u2019s culture. \u201cPeople don\u2019t change because of law and policies. Laws and policies change because of people.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

. . WOMEN’S EQUALITY . . An article by Jane Lanhee Lee and Paresh Dave in Thomson Reuters (reprinted by permission) Thousands of Google employees around the world briefly walked off their jobs on Thursday [November 1] to protest the company\u2019s response to sexual harassment and demand that the world\u2019s largest search engine address rising … Continue reading Google’s ‘#metoo’ moment: Workers walk out over women’s rights<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[76,12],"tags":[11],"class_list":["post-14054","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-global","category-women","tag-global"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14054","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14054"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14054\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14054"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14054"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14054"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}