Google Updates Minimum Standards for Contractors After 900 Employees Sign Petition

Last December, The Guardian posted an expose on the work culture surrounding temps, vendors and contractors (TVCs) at Google, outlining how the company categorizes and treats them differently from full-time employees. Because of increasing pressure from its employees, the tech giant has just issued a new “minimum standards” policy for TVCs.

This change was implemented after Google abruptly reduced the contractual agreement of 34 TVCs in the Google Assistant team. These team members were tasked with creating the witty jokes and adding to the charming personality of Google Assistant.

They were alerted of their shortened contracts on March 8th, with most being told their contracts would be terminated on April 5th, some July 31st. According to Julia Carrie Wong, a reporter at The Guardian, the company’s stance is that these workers are “allowed to apply for full-time jobs, had received a minimum of four weeks’ notice, and could potentially receive another assignment from their staffing agency.”

After this move, over 900 employees signed a letter criticizing Google’s actions. Their three main demands were to 1) respect the contract, 2) allow full time employees to express empathy (prior policy did not allow this) and 3) respect the work and give TVCs full-time employment.

Google replied with a new “minimum standards” policy.

Starting in 2020, “US-based employees who work at least 33 hours a week for Google [will be provided] a minimum wage of $15 an hour.” In addition, they will be provided “comprehensive health insurance, a minimum of eight paid sick days, 12 weeks of paid parental leave, [and] $5,000 per year in tuition reimbursement for skills training and higher education” by 2022. Additionally, Google allowed their members to “express [their] compassion for [TVCs].”

While this is a substantial win for future TVCs, it is still seen as an inadequate fix to the current issues. Not every demand requested by the letter was met. Additionally, these changes will begin in 2020 and 2022, not affecting current TVCs and the 34 “fired” TVCs were not told that their contracts would be respected at the time of this reporting. Finally, these changes only affect US-based employees, although the company did mention it would look to expand the reach to other locations.

All in all, Google moved the needle when it comes to its policy on its workers, but it still does need to do more work to satisfy both its full time and part time workers.