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Comment by deanCommie | Hacker News Reader

> Pichai said, “We need to accept responsibility for the fact that a prominent Black, female leader with immense talent left Google unhappily.”

The best way to accept responsibility would be to start with accepting that she didn't leave, but was pushed out.

No matter how many times people say "you can't expect to act like she did and keep her job", it doesn't change the fact that a lot of company rules have selective enforcement, and HR will always find a way to be in the right when they push you out for being a nuissance to the company.

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I would immediately seek to fire any employee who gave me an unreasonable set of demands with a resignation threat attached to them.

If you can't negotiate calmly in business, you simply won't last long. If you come to the negotiating table with a bazooka then it's a bad look that reflects bad on you.

Right, but that would be a firing; you even said so. Google wants to have it both ways, to be rid of her and pretend that she quit.

She offered to resign if explosive conditions weren't met, and Google said we accept your resignation. I was speaking generally.

If you offer to resign, you must be willing to walk away immediately.

Imagine negotiating with a used car salesman, exclaiming "I'll walk away right now if you don't sell me this car for $X", they call your bluff and then you refuse to walk away. You've lost.

You cannot make threats and expect no repercussions, I don't know why that is even suggested.

> If you offer to resign, you must be willing to walk away immediately.

Of course. But Google has to call that bluff first. They short circuited the process of actually refusing her demands and asking for that resignation letter. If instead they found the ultimatum so offensive that they deemed her worth firing, they should say that. Pretending that she quit without declining her ultimatum and demanding her resignation reeks of bad office politics and bad crisis management.

> You cannot make threats and expect no repercussions, I don't know why that is even suggested

I’m not sure why you’re implying that I suggested that. I did not.

Accepting the resignation explicitly declines the ultimatum.

Again, negotiating with a bazooka is a bad move. It's a highly emotions-driven action from someone who's more angry and upset than they are determined to enact change.

The most effective negotiation involves zero explosive ultimatums.

>If instead they found the ultimatum so offensive that they deemed her worth firing, they should say that

Saying anything opens them up to lawsuits and social media smearing (especially from this individual, who was already in a habit of slandering her colleagues on Twitter).

> especially from this individual

And that's why you take away their corporate email access immediately.

That should be SOP everywhere under every circumstance. When I quit my prior job on good terms my email was immediately disabled and someone politely kept an eye on me to make sure I actually exited the security doors after my exit interview. And that was with a voluntary exit without acrimony.

Google’s management and HR work here seems incredibly sloppy, especially for handling such a high pressure firing.

> Accepting the resignation explicitly declines the ultimatum.

Hilariously, that is implicitly declining the ultimatum. You have it literally backwards. You have to at least mention the ultimatum for it to be explicit.

They also didn’t “accept her resignation”, they jumped from the ultimatum straight to informing her colleagues without actually declining her request or calling her bluff. That’s precisely the problem I’ve been talking about.

> Again, negotiating with a bazooka is a bad move ... The most effective negotiation involves zero explosive ultimatums.

Sure. But that’s completely unrelated to what I’m talking about.

> Saying anything opens them up to lawsuits

Nonsense. If anything else, lying about the precise terms of her exit increases their legal risk, if any exists. Most states are at-will, if they wanted to reduce their legal risk they should’ve either fired her without explanation, or said “yes, I would like that resignation letter you threatened to provide”.

> and social media smearing

What a ridiculous excuse. If you can’t handle some mean tweets, don’t become an executive at Google. Turn off your notifications or something, seriously.

And since we’re still here talking about it, I think we can all agree that the executives absolutely failed in this goal.

> especially from this individual, who was already in a habit of slandering her colleagues on Twitter

Assuming this is true, then the way they fired her was one of the most bone-headed things I have ever heard. If you have an employee who’s toxic and famous on Twitter, the last thing you should do is get caught in a trivial lie when firing them. It absolutely torches any credibility you have in this context and it gives ammunition to someone that you know has an audience, a willingness to throw flames, and now has a serious axe to grind. The fallout from this should have been predictable to them.

It’s especially stupid since she offered them an easy out on a silver platter. All they had to do was request her resignation! She literally offered it! Then if she tried to claim that she’d been fired, they could produce her resignation letter and make her tank her public credibility. Instead they got caught in a dumb lie which damaged their credibility and gave her an easy way to get out ahead of them on the story and paint herself as the victim.

I’d say “<bleeping> amateurs”, but I happen to know that these executives are getting paid for this, a lot.

Not sure why ppl are downvoting you. Its as if they don't experience with on the job bullying.

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