Executives at Google, one of the richest company's in the world, ran a secret anti-union campaign dubbed Project Vivian to discourage employee activism and 'convince [workers] that unions suck,' a newly released National Labor Relations Board ruling has revealed.
Google enlisted IRI Consultants, an aggressively anti-union firm that reportedly monitors and collects info on employees' finances, union tendencies, and even ethnic backgrounds, to muddle union organization efforts, according to the NLRB document released January 7.
The union watchdog group also found that Michael Pfyl, Google's head of employment law, called the secret scheme an opportunity 'to engage employees more positively' - and 'convince them that unions suck.'
Alphabet, the umbrella company that owns the $3 trillion search behemoth, has 120,000 workers. Only 226 Google employees have signed union cards.
The revelations are the result of an ongoing investigation of a complaint by the Communication Workers of America lodged on behalf of seven Google employees and ex-employees in December 2019 who claimed the company illegally tracked their actions.
Last December, the CWA accused Google of illegally firing, interrogating and surveilling activist employees.
Google has denied any wrongdoing.
One former employee has since settled with the search giant, but five were fired and two were disciplined after engaging in attempts to unionize fellow employees.
In late 2020, the NLRB issued a federal complaint against...
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