Alphabet’s Layoffs Aren’t Googley

Alphabet’s layoffs show that “googley” doesn’t mean shit.

Your core values are the ones you display by your actions when times get rough, not the strings of buzzwords you spout when times are good. I’d verbalize the values they expressed as: “No handoff, no goodbye, you don’t work here GFY”

The way those layoffs were handled was a leadership disaster bound for business school textbooks as an example of how NOT to do a layoff.

Middle of the night email, immediate disabling of accounts and badges. People who’ve been trusted and loyal for decades, out without a word. People who are on call-out without handoff. No explanation of selection criteria, no discussion with managers, no chance for managers to tell affected people to their face. No chill, no faith, no trust, no human touch.

It’s like that scene in the fifth element where the outwardly evil boss revels in the human cost of his layoffs. Only it’s worse because alphabet’s evil is banal and unthinking. The firing in Fifth Element was actually better because at least it was funny.