Senior employee previously reported on a manager’s inappropriate behaviour towards clients and colleagues
A senior Google UK employee is accusing the tech giant of retaliation, claiming she was made redundant after blowing the whistle on a manager’s inappropriate behaviour at work, according to reports.
The employee, who worked as a senior industry head in Google’s UK Sales and Agencies team, claimed that she was subjected to a “relentless campaign of retaliation” after her complaint, the BBC reported, citing court documents.
According to the report, the employee said she was given “little choice” but to swap her successful client account with a failing one, which left her vulnerable to redundancy.
She further claimed that she was demoted to a subordinate role on a big internal project, and that her boss tried to downgrade her performance, among other retaliatory claims.
She was made redundant in March 2024 as part of Google UK’s reorganisation, but the employee claims it was part of the retaliatory moves against her.
What happened?
The alleged acts of retaliation came after the senior employee reported that a manager was telling clients about his swinger lifestyle, with some incidents happening in front of his line manager, who did not intervene, according to the BBC report.
The senior employee also reported that the same manager had allegedly shown another female client a “picture of his wife’s vagina” while scrolling through photos on his phone.
Google UK sacked the manager for gross misconduct after an investigation, which also discovered that he had sexually harassed two female employees during a work event and made inappropriate comments to staff.
The manager’s line manager and another senior colleague were also recommended for documented coaching after failing to intervene. They were also later made redundant.
Google UK accepted that the senior employee’s disclosure was an act of whistleblowing, but denied that it retaliated against her.
The tech giant said in its defence that changes to her role were part of normal business decisions, adding that her role was one of the affected positions in its reorganisation.
The London Central Employment Tribunal is expected to make a judgment on the case in the coming weeks.
In the UK, the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998 protects workers from detrimental treatment or dismissal for whistleblowing.
“As a whistleblower you’re protected by law – you should not be treated unfairly or lose your job because you ‘blow the whistle,'” the UK government said on its website.
