Google is promising to be more forceful and open about its handling of sexual misconduct cases, a week after thousands of high-paid engineers and others walked out in protest over its male-dominated culture.
Google bowed to one of the protesters’ main demands by dropping mandatory arbitration of all sexual misconduct cases. That is now to be optional, so that workers can choose to sue in court and present their case in front of a jury.
It mirrors a change made by ride-hailing service Uber Technologies Inc after complaints from its female employees prompted an internal investigation. The probe concluded that its rank had been poisoned by rampant sexual harassment.
Photo: EPA
“Google’s leaders and I have heard your feedback and have been moved by the stories you’ve shared,” chief executive officer Sundar Pichai said in an e-mail to Google employees. “We recognize that we have not always gotten everything right in the past and we are sincerely sorry for that. It’s clear we need to make some changes.”
Thursday’s e-mail was obtained by The Associated Press.
Last week, the tech giant’s workers left their cubicles in dozens of offices around the world to protest what they consider management’s lax treatment of top executives and other male workers accused of sexual harassment and other misconduct.
The protest’s organizers said that about 20,000 workers participated.
Google said it would provide more details about sexual misconduct cases in internal reports available to all employees.
The breakdowns would include the number of cases that were substantiated within various company departments and list the types of punishment imposed, including firings, pay cuts and mandated counseling.
The company also plans to step up its training aimed at preventing misconduct.
It is requiring all employees to go through the process annually instead of every other year. Those who fall behind in their training, including top executives, would be dinged in annual performance reviews, leaving a blemish that could lower their pay and make it more difficult to get promoted.
However, Google did not address protesters’ demand for a commitment to pay women the same as men doing similar work. When previously confronted with accusations that it shortchanges women — made by the US Department of Labor and in lawsuits filed by female employees — Google has maintained that its compensation system does not discriminate between men and women.
The changes did not go far enough to satisfy Vicki Tardif Holland, a Google employee who helped organize and spoke at the protests near the company’s Cambridge, Massachusetts, office last week.
“While Sundar’s message was encouraging, important points around discrimination, inequity and representation were not addressed,” Holland wrote in an e-mail responding to an AP inquiry.
Nevertheless, employment experts predicted the generally positive outcome of Google’s mass uprising is bound to have ripple effects across Silicon Valley and perhaps the rest of corporate America.
“These things can be contagious,” said Thomas Kochan, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology management professor specializing in employment issues. “I would expect to see other professionals taking action when they see something wrong.”
Some employers might even pre-emptively adopt some of Google’s new policies, given its prestige, said Stephanie Creary, who specializes in workplace and diversity issues at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School.
“When Google does something, other employers tend to copy it,” she said.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”