Google Cloud shows no mercy, firing Dept of Customer Love employees

One member of Looker’s customer-service staff, known as the Department of Customer Love felt they were duped after they were led to believe they were getting promoted before being laid off.

They worked on their performance assessment for nearly a week, convinced that a meeting session with Google Cloud management would need them to highlight their accomplishments at Looker.

Looker, a startup, is a data-analytics subsidiary housed under Google Cloud and was bought by Google nearly precisely two years ago for $2.6 billion—the company’s first significant acquisition under current CEO Thomas Kurian.

There were a few giveaways though. But the workers did not take heed. For example, the meeting was scheduled with a hidden attendee list.

Weeks before the meeting, the company was outsourcing support from other companies, which got some workers to query whether they were going to lose their jobs.

On top of losing their job, the Google section allowed them to believe they were to train those replacing them! They were never told these ‘trainees’ were their replacements.

On a Tuesday evening, one of the employees who trained the ‘replacements’ received a calendar invite for the next day. The invitation was for an “important” meeting with a secret guest list.

Employees expected it would be good news. When they arrived at the meeting, they noticed their manager in tears.

In early March, at least hundreds of workers of Looker’s US-based support crew were laid off. The decision was made “a few months in advance,” according to one Google Cloud executive during an internal town hall following the layoffs, a tape of which was provided with Emerging Tech Brew.

But several Looker executives did not know until the day before the firing—even Looker’s head of engineering didn’t find out until after the incident.

Now, the employees who were working for the Department of Customer Love would certainly think they were working for The Adjustment Bureau.

The Adjustment Bureau is a movie in which squads of usually unnoticed supernatural beings (you shall know them by their hats!) oversee the lives of certain individuals.

The post Google Cloud shows no mercy, firing Dept of Customer Love employees appeared first on The Independent News.