[liberationtech] I Was Google’s Head of International Relations. Here’s Why I Left.

[Yosem Companys]

My solution was to advocate for the adoption of a company-wide, formal
Human Rights Program that would publicly commit Google to adhere to human
rights principles found in the UN Declaration of Human Rights, provide a
mechanism for product and engineering teams to seek internal review of
product design elements, and formalize the use of Human Rights Impact
Assessments for all major product launches and market entries.

But each time I recommended a Human Rights Program, senior executives came
up with an excuse to say no. At first, they said human rights issues were
better handled within the product teams, rather than starting a separate
program. But the product teams weren’t trained to address human rights as
part of their work. When I went back to senior executives to again argue
for a program, they then claimed to be worried about increasing the
company’s legal liability. We provided the opinion of outside experts who
re-confirmed that these fears were unfounded. At this point, a colleague
was suddenly re-assigned to lead the policy team discussions for Dragonfly.
As someone who had consistently advocated for a human rights-based
approach, I was being sidelined from the on-going conversations on whether
to launch Dragonfly. I then realized that the company had never intended to
incorporate human rights principles into its business and product
decisions. Just when Google needed to double down on a commitment to human
rights, it decided to instead chase bigger profits and an even higher stock
price.

It was no different in the workplace culture. Senior colleagues bullied and
screamed at young women, causing them to cry at their desks. At an
all-hands meeting, my boss said, “Now you Asians come to the microphone
too. I know you don’t like to ask questions.” At a different all-hands
meeting, the entire policy team was separated into various rooms and told
to participate in a “diversity exercise” that placed me in a group labeled
“homos” while participants shouted out stereotypes such as “effeminate” and
“promiscuous.” Colleagues of color were forced to join groups called
“Asians” and “Brown people” in other rooms nearby.

In each of these cases, I brought these issues to HR and senior executives
and was assured the problems would be handled. Yet in each case, there was
no follow up to address the concerns — until the day I was accidentally
copied on an email from a senior HR director. In the email, the HR director
told a colleague that I seemed to raise concerns like these a lot, and
instructed her to “do some digging” on me instead.

https://medium.com/@rossformaine/i-was-googles-head-of-international-relations-here-s-why-i-left-49313d23065
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