Google Didn't Fire Diversity Memo Writer For Political Reasons: Pichai

Google CEO Sundar Pichai has said that the company did not fire James Damore for political reasons. Damore wrote the memo in which he implied that women did not have the genetic predisposition for engineering jobs. After the memo was leaked, and went viral, he was fired.

Damore has said that he was fired because he was conservative in a company which is liberal. But Pichai says he was fired because his memo violated the Google code of conduct.

Last week, Damore sued Google for discrimination. The lawsuit said that Google discriminates against white, male and conservative employees

Pichai says that he does not regret firing Damore. “The last thing we do when we make decisions like this is look at it with a political lens,” Pichai said.

Here is what the memo had said:

Damore had said that women do not make up half of the company’s workforce because of genetic differences in their abilities.

“These differences may explain why we don’t see equal representation of women in tech and leadership,” the engineer wrote. “We need to stop assuming that gender gaps imply sexism.”

He said that Google’s efforts to bring more women into the fold have led to discriminatory practices against conservatives. He also says that others in the company agree with his views but “would never have the courage to say or defend because of our shaming culture and the possibility of being fired”.

Google is being investigated for systematically discriminating against women, and has been asked to hand over its salary records to the government in an ongoing investigation by the US Department of Labour.

Danielle Brown, Google’s new VP of diversity, integrity and governance said the essay “advanced incorrect assumptions about gender”.

“Diversity and inclusion are a fundamental part of our values and the culture we continue to cultivate. We are unequivocal in our belief that diversity and inclusion are critical to our success as a company, and we’ll continue to stand for that and be committed to it for the long haul,” she said.

Also Read: Google Told to Handover Salary Details in Discrimination Case