File photo - Google is launching a new search tool specifically to help service members get civilian jobs. (Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.)
Google has a message for employees who harass each other on internal company message boards: Play nice — or else.
The search giant, led by Chief Executive Larry Page, last week sent all Googlers a list of guidelines and internal rules designed to keep employee debates on diversity and politics from getting too heated.
The guidelines implore Google employees to “respect each other” and ask them to “avoid blanket statements about groups or categories of people.” The Palo Alto, Calif. company also made clear that “trolling, name calling, and ad hominem attacks will not be tolerated.”
Employees who don’t toe the new company line will see their posting and viewing privileges revoked, and may receive “disciplinary action as warranted.”
Google employees have been at odds over the company’s diversity practices — a topic that was brought to a head last summer when James Damore, a former Google engineer, was fired after publishing an internal memo saying that women are worse at engineering due to their biology.
The company’s message boards have become a hotbed, with pro-diversity employees finding themselves on the receiving end of abuse and conservative employees saying that Google makes them feel unwelcome.
Google is hoping its move will help settle things internally, as it is the target of numerous lawsuits from current and former employees from all sides of the political spectrum who claim to have been wronged by the Silicon Valley juggernaut.
This story originally appeared in the New York Post.
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