January 2023 was a chaotic month inside Google. Without warning, the company announced 12,000 layoffs—roughly 6% of its global workforce. Panic set in as employees woke up to find their access suddenly revoked. There were stories of people discovering their fate while on parental leave, others mid-project, or even while on-call. Overnight, the atmosphere shifted from business-as-usual to fear and uncertainty.
For those of us still employed, the question was simple: What now? Information was scarce, especially for non-US offices where local legal requirements could stretch the process for months. Rumors flew around in chat rooms, but clarity was hard to find. I felt the need to do something that could help us make sense of the chaos. So, I decided to start a simple experiment: a blank Google Doc shared with write access to nearly 200,000 Googlers.
The goal was to create a centralized resource for people to share what they knew. I seeded the document with a simple description: “This includes official information, internal discussions, press coverage, and top memes of each day (as a proxy for employee morale/concerns).” It was an open invitation for anyone to add sourced information—links to news articles, anecdotes shared by laid-off employees on LinkedIn, official country-specific announcements, petitions, and coverage of employee walkouts. I posted the link in a couple of internal comments and waited to see what would happen.
Within days, the document began to spread.
Employees’ Communication at Google
Google offers many internal communication channels, but none are perfect. Chat rooms are great for quick exchanges, but often overwhelm users with fragmented rumors. Google Groups provide official updates, but these are formal and sparse. There used to be Google+, a platform that led to interesting open discussions. I remember once posting a message on Google+ that got reshared so many times it caught the attention of Sundar Pichai himself. But Google+ (and Currents) usage went down and no platform emerged for spontaneous, broad conversations, despite some attempts.
A few years ago, someone circulated a crowdsourced salary spreadsheet. That spreadsheet gained momentum as people anonymously added their pay data, sparking discussions on pay equity and transparency. It was the inspiration behind my experiment. I wondered—could I replicate that same viral effect for sharing information about layoffs?
The document took off, and the main vehicle for its spread was Memegen—the internal meme platform. Memes may be lighthearted, but they often come with context links, and that’s where the critical information lay. My document was linked in memes, and from there, it spread like wildfire. The visit counter quickly exceeded the number of employees at Google.
Spread and Impact
What started as a simple collection of links quickly became a go-to resource for thousands of employees. Updates came in from around the globe—information about severance packages, summaries of town hall meetings, official company statements, and news articles covering the layoffs.
Several people messaged me privately, expressing fear about contributing openly. The fear of retaliation was real—what if their names in the edit history put them at risk? One employee, who had created a layoff-related spreadsheet, handed over ownership to me. He said his manager had warned him about the career risks of being associated with such an effort. Interestingly, you can transfer ownership of a Google Doc without the recipient's explicit approval. A bit unexpected, but I didn’t mind.
At the end, the fears didn’t seem justified. Pretty much everyone saw the document, but no one complained. I expected someone would tell me to moderate the document, as it occasionally included screenshots of confidential messages. I also expected concerns about potential leaks to journalists. But nothing happened. No one in my reporting chain asked me anything.
I noticed an interesting pattern: people began reaching out to me directly. Some assumed I was an expert on the layoff process, asking for advice or clarification on severance details. I even started getting recognized in the office. Colleagues would stop me in the hallways, often with a mix of curiosity and gratitude: “You’re the one who set up the layoff doc, right? Thank you for doing that.”
The response was very positive, some even sent peer bonuses as a token of appreciation—which my manager quickly approved. It felt as if the company itself had unofficially sanctioned this effort.
A Security Notification
One evening, I received a message from a security team. My heart raced. It was about my document. They said that the document has been accessed by people outside the google.com domain, and asked me if it was intentional. How could this happen? I immediately checked the settings, scrolling through a list of names. That’s when I realized that anyone with write access could reshare the document.
The first thing I noticed was a long list of chat rooms. When someone shares a Google Doc link in a chat room, they’re often prompted to expand the document’s permissions to include the entire room. Even though it wasn’t necessary, people kept clicking "yes". By the end, I had over a thousand chat rooms listed in the document’s permissions. I found it both hilarious and slightly alarming.
As I went through the list, I also found a few email addresses ending in @gmail.com. That was concerning. After a quick investigation, it seemed likely that these accounts belonged to Googlers using their personal accounts. I quickly removed all these lines, restricted the sharing settings, and enabled a somewhat hidden feature to prevent further resharing.
The person from the security team responded promptly: “Thanks for the update, looks good on our end”. That was it. The tension disappeared immediately.
The Challenge of Leaks
A few months later, I decided to leave Google. Feeling it was time for a new chapter, I took time to travel. While walking through Trebinje, a lovely town in Republika Srpska, I received an unexpected message from a journalist. He referenced the document and said “If I recall correctly, you were maybe the one who set it up?” He was surprised that employees had to gather this information themselves, and added: “It suggested a lot of the information wasn’t being shared by leaders, and so employees were having to collect it together themselves.”
That message made me pause. It highlighted a key issue: leadership at Google had become increasingly secretive. Back in the day, TGIF meetings were filled with candid discussions about upcoming products and company strategy. But as leaks to journalists became more frequent, leaders shared less and less, fearful that confidential information would end up in the press.
This is why I created the document. Employees needed information during a chaotic and uncertain time, and the official channels weren’t providing it. I wanted to provide a space for real, verified information, not just speculation. And to emphasize its intended use, I placed a large banner at the top: “INTERNAL document—of course, do not share the content with anyone outside Google.”
Ironically, despite these precautions, someone did leak it to a journalist. While it was probably harmless, it was a reminder of the challenges of internal communication. The constant fear of leaks has made leadership more cautious, but it has also created a gap in communication.