Google employees gathered on the grass at the company’s Mountain View headquarters Thursday. Nearly 100 of them. They wore black shirts. They carried signs. And they unfurled a banner listing more than 4,500 names.
The message was clear. Job security matters. Even at one of the world’s most profitable technology companies.
Parul Koul stood before the crowd. As president of the Alphabet Workers Union and a Google software engineer, she delivered a direct list of demands. “We want voluntary exits before layoffs, we want guaranteed severance standards, we want an end to performance quotas.” The words hung in the air. Workers cheered.
This rally, reported by Business Insider, marks the latest escalation in a campaign that began in early 2025. Back then, employees circulated a petition addressed to CEO Sundar Pichai. They worried about instability. “Ongoing rounds of layoffs make us feel insecure about our jobs,” the petition stated, according to coverage in CNBC. “The company is clearly in a strong financial position, making the loss of so many valuable colleagues without explanation hurt even more.”
More than 1,250 signed it initially. By Thursday’s event the total had climbed past 4,500. Twice as many as when organizers first tried to deliver the document. That earlier attempt yielded little response from leadership. So workers kept at it. They wore shirts. They sent mass emails. They collected hundreds of photos showing personal reasons for fighting. The union detailed these steps on its own site at alphabetworkersunion.org.
Voluntary exit packages emerged. Google offered them to more than 70,000 employees across multiple rounds. The latest came in February 2026. Pichai himself acknowledged the program. It “gives people agency,” he said, after listening to staff. No other major tech firm matched the scale. Yet the union sees it as partial progress at best. The packages remain discretionary. Not a formal policy. And they don’t address every concern.
Employees want guaranteed severance for anyone laid off. At least matching the January 2023 level of 16 weeks’ pay plus two weeks for every additional year of service. They want those buyouts extended before any forced cuts. They want the option to treat severance as extended paid leave, helpful for those on visas. And they want an end to the GRAD performance system. That forced distribution of ratings, they argue, creates constant anxiety.
Nobel Barakat, a Google software engineer, described the changed mood. “I see worried people, grateful to still have a job, do the best they can to keep it. I’ve seen people work longer and longer days with the hopes that they avoid a sudden poor performance rating.” His words captured the shift. From a place once known for creativity to one defined by caution.
Matthew Hoffman, an engineer at Google DeepMind, spoke too. He hasn’t been impacted yet. Still he showed up. “I think I realized that just because something hasn’t affected you personally doesn’t mean it won’t someday.” Simple logic. Powerful when repeated across a workforce of nearly 370,000 at Alphabet.
The union counts about 1,400 members. A small fraction. But its influence stretches further through these actions. Tabling events. Conversations with colleagues at the Mountain View campus in May. Visibility days that drew over 1,000 participants total. Bay Area Current covered the broader organizing push at bayareacurrent.com, noting how the effort builds momentum even as some take the exit packages.
One who did, Jim Laskey, told that outlet the timing created panic. Others described eroded culture. Dan Freedman, a 14-year veteran, pointed to a “pot has been boiling” feeling. Joshua Carroll, an organizer, highlighted growing solidarity in San Francisco offices.
Google maintains it does not use forced rating distributions. Every employee receives evaluation based on performance, role and expectations set with managers. A spokesperson told CNBC as much in 2025. New CFO Anat Ashkenazi had signaled more cost discipline that year. “Any organization can always push a little further,” she said, as artificial intelligence spending ramped up.
Layoffs started big. Twelve thousand in 2023. Smaller rounds followed, hitting various teams. Thousands more affected in total. The pattern continued quietly into 2026. One analysis on Medium estimated 1,500 to 3,000 engineers displaced this year alone through performance reviews, restructurings and buyouts. No single announcement. No headline number. Just steady pressure.
AI sits at the center. Companies race to build it. They pour in capital. They cut elsewhere to fund the infrastructure. Demis Hassabis, Nobel Prize winner and head of Google DeepMind, pushed back on the narrative. Layoffs aren’t driven by the technology itself, he argued at a recent event. They result from “imitative behavior.” Firms slash headcount because others do. A lack of imagination, in his view.
Workers see different risks. AI could reshape roles. Make some obsolete. Heighten performance expectations. The rally reflected that unease. Chants rose. “Google, Google, can’t you see? We deserve security.” Signs demanded action.
This isn’t Google’s first brush with internal dissent. Far from it. In 2018 more than 4,000 opposed Project Maven, the Pentagon contract using AI on drone footage. Twenty thousand walked out later that year over handling of sexual misconduct claims. In 2024, sit-ins protested Project Nimbus, the cloud deal with the Israeli government. Google fired some participants.
Just this week a DeepMind researcher resigned. The company had signed an agreement letting the Pentagon use its AI for classified operations. Around 600 employees had urged Pichai to block it. Their power feels diminished now. Layoffs breed caution. Fear of retaliation lingers. A Fortune article from May explored exactly that shift at fortune.com.
Broader protests echo the sentiment. Four hundred people marched in San Francisco this month outside offices of OpenAI, Anthropic and Google DeepMind. They called to pause the AI race amid surging layoffs. The Financial Express reported the scene at financialexpress.com. Not anti-AI, organizers stressed. But frustrated at exclusion from the upside while jobs disappear. Tech layoffs averaged 1,115 per day at points this year.
Union leaders believe organization can still work. Koul put it plainly. “We have the power to change things for ourselves. The only thing preventing us is how organized we are.” The campaign continues. More visibility actions planned. More conversations on campuses.
Google offered no comment on Thursday’s rally. Executives stayed silent as petition copies were slipped under doors early that morning. One went to Pichai’s office. An aide promised delivery. Whether it prompts real change remains uncertain.
What stands out is the focus. Not on ethics or military contracts this time. On something more immediate. The right to stability in a career many once viewed as secure. As AI transforms the industry, employees demand a voice in how the costs and benefits distribute. They’ve won voluntary packages. They seek more.
The banner with 4,500 names stretched long across the grass. A visible reminder. These workers built the products generating billions. They expect the company to remember that. Even as it chases the next technological leap.
WebProNews is an iEntry Publication