Video: YouTube Music workers discover they’re laid off while seeking help from Austin City Council
As members of the YouTube Music team appealed to the Austin City Council to help them kick off bargaining talks with Google Thursday, they learned their jobs were being terminated, as captured in a video that made its way around social media. Jack Benedict, a member of the union, was making his case for the council’s support when his coworker Katie Marschner walked up from behind, hands tucked in front of her, and saddled up to the microphone from his right side, seemingly catching him a bit off guard. “Not to interrupt,” she said, with a trembling voice, “but they just laid us all off.” “Oh . . . wow,” Benedict had time to say, just as the chime sounded signaling his time before the council had expired. this is the exact moment our coworkers found out we had been laid off while speaking in front of city council pic.twitter.com/IcsCszGe3Z— jacob (@peepaw_) March 1, 2024 The job cuts come months after the Austin-based team voted to join the Alphabet Workers Union-CWA. Google has previously refused to negotiate with the workers, saying they were contractors, not employees. That led the team to seek support from city officials. The Austin City Council passed the resolution in a 9-1 vote, supporting the now-laid off workers. “This is devastating,” said Benedict in a statement. “We have been fighting for years now to get Google, one of the most powerful and well-resourced companies in the world, to negotiate with us so that we could make a living in exchange for the work we do to make their products better. It is disgusting that Google has taken this path when confronted with its workers’ modest demands to be treated fairly on the job.” Alphabet maintains the workers were never actually Google employees. Instead, it says they worked for Cognizant, a professional services company that was a subcontractor. And the layoffs, it maintains, were solely a result of the contract expiring. “As we’ve shared before, these are not Google employees,” the company said in a statement. “Cognizant is responsible for these workers’ employment terms, including staffing. As is the case here, contracts with our suppliers across the company routinely end on their natural expiry date, which was agreed to with Cognizant.” Cognizant, in a statement of its own, called the end of the contract “a normal part of [its] business operations” and said workers would receive nearly two months of severance as well as assistance finding new positions. “This contract ended at its planned expiration date,” the company said. “Our associates are at the heart of our business, and Cognizant has an established process for connecting associates with new opportunities across our global organization when these changes arise. These associates will become part of our deployable talent pool, better known as our ‘bench,’ where they are given seven weeks of dedicated, paid time to explore other roles within the organization and build new skills through our training ecosystem.” The union calls the subcontracting label “a mechanism by which Google distances itself from its responsibilities to its workers,” noting the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) upheld a ruling that recognized Google and Cognizant as joint employers of the workers. Google has appealed that decision. “We have no objection to these Cognizant employees electing to form a union,” Google told Fast Company. “We simply believe it’s only appropriate for Cognizant, as their employer, to engage in collective bargaining. We’re appealing the NLRB’s joint employer decision to federal court as Google does not control the employment terms or conditions of these Cognizant workers.” The Alphabet Works Union was formed in 2021 by 225 engineers and other workers at the company. It currently represents over 1,400 workers across the company.
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As members of the YouTube Music team appealed to the Austin City Council to help them kick off bargaining talks with Google Thursday, they learned their jobs were being terminated, as captured in a video that made its way around social media.
Jack Benedict, a member of the union, was making his case for the council’s support when his coworker Katie Marschner walked up from behind, hands tucked in front of her, and saddled up to the microphone from his right side, seemingly catching him a bit off guard. “Not to interrupt,” she said, with a trembling voice, “but they just laid us all off.”
“Oh . . . wow,” Benedict had time to say, just as the chime sounded signaling his time before the council had expired.
The job cuts come months after the Austin-based team voted to join the Alphabet Workers Union-CWA. Google has previously refused to negotiate with the workers, saying they were contractors, not employees. That led the team to seek support from city officials. The Austin City Council passed the resolution in a 9-1 vote, supporting the now-laid off workers.
“This is devastating,” said Benedict in a statement. “We have been fighting for years now to get Google, one of the most powerful and well-resourced companies in the world, to negotiate with us so that we could make a living in exchange for the work we do to make their products better. It is disgusting that Google has taken this path when confronted with its workers’ modest demands to be treated fairly on the job.”
Alphabet maintains the workers were never actually Google employees. Instead, it says they worked for Cognizant, a professional services company that was a subcontractor. And the layoffs, it maintains, were solely a result of the contract expiring.
“As we’ve shared before, these are not Google employees,” the company said in a statement. “Cognizant is responsible for these workers’ employment terms, including staffing. As is the case here, contracts with our suppliers across the company routinely end on their natural expiry date, which was agreed to with Cognizant.”
Cognizant, in a statement of its own, called the end of the contract “a normal part of [its] business operations” and said workers would receive nearly two months of severance as well as assistance finding new positions.
“This contract ended at its planned expiration date,” the company said. “Our associates are at the heart of our business, and Cognizant has an established process for connecting associates with new opportunities across our global organization when these changes arise. These associates will become part of our deployable talent pool, better known as our ‘bench,’ where they are given seven weeks of dedicated, paid time to explore other roles within the organization and build new skills through our training ecosystem.”
The union calls the subcontracting label “a mechanism by which Google distances itself from its responsibilities to its workers,” noting the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) upheld a ruling that recognized Google and Cognizant as joint employers of the workers.
Google has appealed that decision.
“We have no objection to these Cognizant employees electing to form a union,” Google told Fast Company. “We simply believe it’s only appropriate for Cognizant, as their employer, to engage in collective bargaining. We’re appealing the NLRB’s joint employer decision to federal court as Google does not control the employment terms or conditions of these Cognizant workers.”
The Alphabet Works Union was formed in 2021 by 225 engineers and other workers at the company. It currently represents over 1,400 workers across the company.
