Rating:
3 Stars

In a nutshell:
Author Stapleton shares the story of how Google forced her out in retaliation for trying to improve the workplace.

Best for:
Anyone who still thinks corporations might actually care about their employees. Anyone embarking on their journey of improving the workplace.

Quote that made me think:
N/A

Why I chose it:
My partner works in tech and is heavily involved in workplace organizing. Oh, the stories he could tell…

Review:
Before writing this, I checked out some of the reviews, and it’s interesting how many people jumped at the chance to minimize what Stapleton experienced. It’s fascinating how quickly people defend poor corporations from these ‘entitled’ people. A strong ‘suck it up’ ethos runs through many of the negative reviews, which is so disappointing and unimaginative. These folks just can’t bring themselves a different world, where it wasn’t okay to treat people like shit. Now, there is definitely a validity to those who are skeptical because Stapleton’s activism only appeared when she was the one being mistreated. But also … that’s kind of how life works for many privileged people? Like, it would be absolutely fantastic if we all sprung forth from the womb fully aware of injustice and recognizing that even if our lives are good, others need support. That we immediately recognized when we were being used by higher ups to fortify the status quo. And obviously some people just get it from the get go, usually due to having grown up in oppression. But obviously not everyone does (or at least not in the same ways), and if those of us interested in change try to push these folks out of the movement, nothing will get done.

Onto MY take on it …

This is not ‘Careless People’ for Google. And I think that’s a good thing. It’s not focused on the super high up people (though they are discussed), but instead focuses on the insidiousness of the culture of the corporate world – in this case, tech – and how using ‘positive’ jargon and ‘hip’ lingo convinced a lot of people that THIS corporate was somehow different. When in reality, it, like every other corporate office out there, just doesn’t care about the workers unless the workers do exactly what they want in service of making the most money regardless of the cost to society. The culture is pervasive, and it impacts the day to day work.

To be clear: Google is not, and I’d argue never was, this fantastic Utopian company. They certainly were better in the start – and Stapleton talks about what it was like in the beginning of her dozen years there – but they’ve always been interested in making the most money. It’s pretty obvious these days, when one can’t really use Google as a search engine anymore without facing a bullshit AI summary followed buy more AI slop.

Part of this book is memoir, and we learn about Stapleton’s youth, including losing her brother to an accident when they were both just starting out in the world. This obviously colors her life and focus, and her brother is mentioned often when she is facing a moral dilemma. But most of it is specifically about her twelve years at Google, and how she was moved around to teams, dealt with misogyny and bro culture, and after she organized a walk-out related to Google treated those accused of sexual harassment, she was retaliated against. The desperation of her higher ups in trying to frame it as anything other than that is so familiar. Just look at what is going on with Rockstar Games in Scotland right now – they fired over 30 people for union organizing, and then lied and said it was for breaking NDAs. (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cqxvzwnerq0o). Companies will do anything and everything to keep workers in line, and then lie about it, and clearly Google is no different.

The book itself isn’t the most well-written, and the author clearly speaks of some of the past through the lenses of where she is now in life. But there are some good bits in here, and I think the book is worth reading.

Would I recommend it to its target audience:
Yes