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On the day a pro-Trump mob raided the US Capitol, a worried GitHub employee warned his colleagues in the Washington, DC area to be careful.
After commenting on Slack in the company, “Everyone should be careful, the Nazis are moving around,” one of my colleagues said he was uncomfortable and said that such abusive words were not suitable for the workplace. Two days later, he was fired, and HR officials cited “behavioral patterns that don’t encourage company policy” as the reason for the dismissal, he told TechCrunch.
In an interview with TechCrunch, he said he was a “former” employee and was genuinely worried about his Jewish family as well as his colleagues in the area.
TechCrunch has agreed not to reveal the identity of the dismissed employee, fearing the safety of him and his family.
As Business Insider first reported, his dismissal led to the circulation of internal documents calling on GitHub to denounce white supremacism and the Nazis. Employees also asked for an explanation for his dismissal. As a result, GitHub CEO Nat Friedman told those employees that the company would investigate the dismissal in question.
The dismissed employee is currently looking for a lawyer to keep his family safe, and is looking for ways to compensate for damages and reconcile. According to the dismissed employee, GitHub is seeking help from him for an internal investigation, but is waiting to negotiate with the company until he gets a lawyer.
Still, he is not optimistic about the investigation.
“I’m 90% confident that I’m not honest,” said the dismissed employee about Friedman’s response. “I’ve had this kind of story before. In the case of ICE (Federal Bureau of Investigation), the company said,’Let’s exchange a lot of opinions,’ but when I say ICE, I get fired. I used to believe in this company, but now I don’t. ”
Like some employees want, the dismissed employee sees this as an opportunity for GitHub to take a stance on white supremacy.
He said, “This is an opportunity for GitHub to really wipe out (the radicals) and say,’Does this company need white supremacists and how can black leaders be put into management?'” I think it can be. ”
The latter point is what he’s been looking for since he joined GitHub. But as he continued to speak about the lack of diversity at the leadership level, he realized that his work was at stake.
“If I kept talking about that, I was threatened to get fired in October,” he says. “When I point out that the sales team has only two people of color, both of my bosses have to defend me completely and beg the company not to fire me. It was. ”
[Updated January 16th]The fired Git Hubber then made it clear that he meant the sales leadership team, not the entire sales team.A GitHub spokeswoman told TechCrunch about the content of this article:
“We take all these types of complaints seriously. We are currently actively investigating.”
According to a former employee, the company gave him compensation for two salary periods and fired him. He says he will accept some form of settlement, including compensation for damages and medical expenses. He doesn’t want to return to work, but he says he hopes to increase the authority of GitHub employees.
“If there’s a magic stick, I hope GitHub employees will have a union and speak for people in the marginalized community,” he said.
[Updated January 17, US time]GitHub issued a new statement on Twitter and the company’s blog on the morning of January 17, canceling the “turnover” and resigning from the HR manager.“The recent employee turnover revealed a serious error in our decisions and procedures. We canceled the turnover and the Human Resources Manager took personal responsibility and resigned from GitHub. We sincerely apologize to all employees. I will. ”
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