Diversity Memo Drama Poses Biggest Public Test for Google CEO
Many employees praised the CEO's decision to fire an engineer -- but there's not a consensus
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In almost two years as Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai has weathered multiple storms with relative ease. His search engine came out of the fake news brouhaha largely unscathed. He watched his employees walk out en masse over immigration restrictions ordered by U.S. President Donald Trump, lending his support without drawing heat from the White House. He avoided major fallout after scores of advertisers boycotted YouTube over offensive video content. And he’s continued to post double-digit sales growth, helping to propel shares of parent company Alphabet Inc. to records – even as the European Union ratchets up its antitrust scrutiny.
But a single memo is shaping up to be Pichai’s greatest trial yet.