Analysis of Gender Discrimination at Google: Ethical Theories Applied

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of the gender discrimination case at Google, focusing on the ethical issues in management. The assignment examines the lawsuit filed by female employees, detailing allegations of pay disparities, lower career tracks, and unequal opportunities compared to their male counterparts. The report delves into the specifics of the case, including the plaintiffs' claims, the company's responses, and the findings of investigations. It critically analyzes the stakeholders involved, including the plaintiffs and Google's management, highlighting violations of ethical principles such as dignity, reliability, fairness, and responsiveness. The report also explores how the situation could have been handled differently, suggesting the application of utilitarianism to maximize social welfare and proposing a stakeholder analysis to address the issues effectively. The plagiarism scan report confirms the originality of the student's work. This assignment is available on Desklib, a platform offering AI-based study tools for students.

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Individual Assignment
on
Analysis of real life business situation and application of
Ethical theories therein
Area of exploration: Gender Discrimination
Module: Ethical Issues in Management
Submission Date: October 6, 2020
Submitted to: Submitted by:
Dr. Alaknanda Menon Name: Nitin Jaitly
NMIMS Mumbai Roll Number: E029
SAP ID: 80511020384

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The Issue of Gender Discrimination at Google
Overview
Gender Discrimination or Sexism is an idea that depicts that men and women are not
equal. The differences between the two genders arise from norms of biologies, cultures
and psychologies. There have been several cases pertaining to discriminations between
two individuals based only on genders of the individuals. Some of these cases happen
in professional corporate world. Historically, there have been allegations as well as
court cases filed against several big companies such as Microsoft, Twitter, Salesforce,
and Google for their sexist practices. We shall discuss, in particular, the gender
discrimination situation that arose at big tech giant Google.
Case and the facts
In particular, we shall discuss here the case Ellis v. Google 1, a lawsuit that was filed in
September 2017, accusing Google executives of gender bias. The law suit was filed by
three women – Kelly Ellis, Holly Pease and Kelli Wisuri. The complaint in the law suit
was particularly pertaining to the fact that the three women were placed on lower
career tracks than their male colleagues, due to which they earned less wages bonuses.
Further, the lawsuit alleged that the women, in general, lost out on thousands of
dollars2 each year compared with male counterparts as a result of the discriminatory
practices. The complaint also included the accusation that the tech-giant discriminates
in terms of payments and wages between the women (from coders to teachers in
Google’s in-house childcare department) and the men. Furthermore, a memorandum
was filed in the court to classify the lawsuit as a class action which would mean that
the lawsuit applied to 10800 women who had been employed by Google since
September 2013.
1 B. (2020, July 22). Google women seek class-action status for gender-pay lawsuit. Hindustan Times Tech.
https://tech.hindustantimes.com/tech/news/google-women-seek-class-action-status-for-gender-pay-lawsuit-
71595404165324.html
2 Paul, K. (2020a, July 24). Women at Google miss out on thousands of dollars as a result of pay discrimination,
lawsuit alleges. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/jul/22/google-gender-pay-
discrimination-lawsuit

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According to David Neumark, a Professor of Economics at the University of California
Irvine, women at Google made an average $2000 less per year than men. Further, his
calculations showed that the women at Google might be losing out on $17000 per year
because of gender discriminatory practices at Google. As per Neumark’s analysis, the
likelihood of such differential practices occurring by chance rather than by direct
discrimination is 1 in 100. Although Google said that it had discontinued such
practices in 2017, but lawsuit alleged that Google had since failed to address the
existing inequalities at the company.
The lawsuit alleged that women were consistently pushed into lower-level job tracks
and paid less than their male counterparts with similar job descriptions. Kelly Ellis, the
main plaintiff, claimed that when she was hired, she had enough experience to be
placed at a higher responsibility level but she could not understand how the
classification system worked at Google. Later, she realized that the male colleagues
with similar education had been assigned more responsibilities and higher pay from the
beginning.
Another plaintiff in the case claimed that the Google management blamed the lower
pay on her work quality or the performance in her initial job interview but the
investigations found that this was not the case. In fact, her interview scores were higher
than her male counterparts.
Critical Analysis and Perspective of the case
The above-described “Google” case has two major stakeholders: the plaintiff
(including the main complainant Kelly Ellis) and the management teams of the
company “Google” itself.
The issue in this case is the discrimination that the women face at Google in terms of
payment of salaries, assignment of responsibility levels and promotion opportunities.
Upon critically analyzing the case, we observe that women, despite having equal level
of work experience, educational qualifications, and skill sets as those possessed by
men, were denied the opportunities of promotion, salary hikes and high level
responsibilities. However, their counterpart male colleagues were given all these
benefits. This issue becomes even worse when upon analysis of the case, it is found
that Google did not do anything to address the existing discriminatory practices even
after it said that it had discontinued such practices in 2017.

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Another issue is that Google was not able to give a proper justification to the female
employees as to why were they denied the benefits, their male counterparts were
getting. Google tried fooling the women employees by saying that the reason for not
giving equal payments, equal promotion opportunities and equal levels of work
responsibilities to the plaintiff women was merely that these women had lower work
quality and lower performance in their initial job interviews. However, upon
investigation, it was found that these women had actually scored higher than the men
in the interviews. Despite that, the male employees were placed on higher career tracks
and were given higher wage bonuses as compared to the female employees.
Hence, in view of above-mentioned analysis, it is evident that that the women, if not
better, but were performing at same quality levels as those of men. Yet, the females
were denied higher wages and better work responsibilities as opposed to men. All of
this happened just because of the sexist and discriminatory approach followed by the
tech-giant Google.
Violation of Ethical principles
1) Dignity
The company denied a basic human right of the women employees, pertaining to
“Equal pay for equal work”. According to ethical theories and perspectives, if a
company respects human rights and does not violate them, then only it is maintaining
the dignity.
2) Reliability
The company made a fraudulent promise of discontinuing the discriminatory practices
in 2017 but did not do anything to solve the existing such practices. The women
employees lost the reliability over the company’s promises due to non-fulfillment of
their needs.
3) Fairness
The company had been doing gender based discrimination in terms of providing wage
bonuses and work responsibilities against women. The discrimination was unfair as
women, despite delivering, if not better, equal quality of work as that delivered by
men, were being denied opportunities of receiving promotions and bonus wages.

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4) Responsiveness
The company was not serious about the concerns raised by the female employees
regarding the company’s sexist approach. The company although promised to resolve
the issues, but never did anything practically to find a solution. Even when the female
employees asked the company’s management to give them a reason of not promoting
the, Google responded carelessly by saying that their work quality and the initial
interview performances were below par. Whereas, it was found later that their initial
interview experiences were at times even better than male counterparts.
How to handle the situation
If I were the Google’s management head, one of the major stakeholders with respect to
the entire scenario, I would have tried to control the situation before hand. In
particular, I would have stopped the eventual plaintiffs and would have tried to resolve
the issue before it could reach the court.
I would have used the approach of Utilitarianism by aiming to maximize the social
welfare by balancing the interest of individuals who would have been impacted by the
likely consequences. In this regard, I would have got a thorough investigation
conducted into the matter. If the allegations were still found to be true, I would have
planned a model which would ensure that there would be no discriminatory practices in
the office with regard to employees’ growth and bonus wages. The below stakeholder
analysis would have given a clearer picture of the actions:
Stakeholders Likely Impact
Short term
Likely Impact
Long term
Google and its management Would be saved from
court case
Would maintain a greater
reputation in the minds of
future employees
Women Employees Would be happy and
satisfied
Would describe Google as
an ideal work place.
Further, I would have self-introspected into the fact that whether I would be meeting
my duties as a management head? That way, I would have realized that I might be

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violating the principles of dignity, reliability, fairness and responsiveness (as described
above) by not taking any actions for solving the issues at hand.
Thus, the above-mentioned approaches could have been used in the Google’s case so
as to benefit the society as a whole and to ensure that the justice is delivered without
any delay.

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Individual Assignment on Analysis of real life business situation and application of Ethical theories therein Area of
exploration: Gender DiscriminationModule: Ethical Issues in Management SubmissionDate: October 6, 2020
Submitted to: Submitted by: Dr. Alaknanda Menon Name: Nitin Jaitly NMIMS Mumbai Roll Number: E029 SAP ID
80511020384 The Issue of Gender Discrimination at Google Overview Gender Discrimination or Sexism is an idea that
depicts that men and women are not equal. The differences between the two genders arise from norms of biologies,
cultures and psychologies. There have been several cases pertaining to discriminations between two individuals
based only on genders of the individuals. Some of these cases happen in professional corporate world. Historically,
there have been allegations as well as court cases filed against several big companies such as Microsoft, Twitter,
Salesforce, and Google for their sexist practices. We shall discuss, in particular, the gender discrimination situation
that arose at big tech giant Google. Case and the facts In particular, we shall discuss here the case Ellis v. Google, a
lawsuit that was filed in September 2017, accusing Google executives of gender bias. The law suit was filed by three
women – Kelly Ellis, Holly Pease and Kelli Wisuri. The complaint in the law suit was particularly pertaining to the fact
that the three women were placed on lower career tracks than their male colleagues, due to which they earned less
wages bonuses. Further, the lawsuit alleged that the women, in general, lost out on thousands of dollars each year
compared with male counterparts as a result of the discriminatory practices. The complaint also included the
accusation that the tech-giant discriminates in terms of payments and wages between the women (from coders
teachers in Google’s in-house childcare department) and the men. Furthermore, a memorandum was filed in the court
to classify the lawsuit as a class action which would mean that the lawsuit applied to 10800 women who had been
employed by Google since September 2013. According to David Neumark, a Professor of Economics at the University
of California Irvine, women at Google made an average $2000 less per year than men. Further, his calculations
showed that the women at Google might be losing out on $17000 per year because of gender discriminatory practices
at Google. As per Neumark’s analysis, the likelihood of such differential practices occurring by chance rather than by
direct discrimination is 1 in 100. Although Google said that it had discontinued such practices in 2017, but laws
alleged that Google had since failed to address the existing inequalities at the company. The lawsuit alleged th
women were consistently pushed into lower-level job tracks and paid less than their male counterparts with similar
job descriptions. Kelly Ellis, the main plaintiff, claimed that when she was hired, she had enough experience to be
placed at a higher responsibility level but she could not understand how the classification system worked at Google.
Later, she realized that the male colleagues with similar education had been assigned more responsibilities and

higher pay from the beginning. Another plaintiff in the case claimed that the Google management blamed the lower
pay on her work quality or the performance in her initial job interview but the investigations found that this was not
the case. In fact, her interview scores were higher than her male counterparts. Critical Analysis and Perspective of
the case The above-described “Google” case has two major stakeholders: the plaintiff (including the main
complainant Kelly Ellis) and the management teams of the company “Google” itself. The issue in this case is t
discrimination that the women face at Google in terms of payment of salaries, assignment of responsibility levels and
promotion opportunities. Upon critically analyzing the case, we observe that women, despite having equal level of
work experience, educational qualifications, and skill sets as those possessed by men, were denied the
opportunities of promotion, salary hikes and high level responsibilities. However, their counterpart male colleagues
were given all these benefits. This issue becomes even worse when upon analysis of the case, it is found that
Google did not do anything to address the existing discriminatory practices even after it said that it had discontinued
such practices in 2017. Another issue is that Google was not able to give a proper justification to the female
employees as to why were they denied the benefits, their male counterparts were getting. Google tried fooling the
women employees by saying that the reason for not giving equal payments, equal promotion opportunities and equal
levels of work responsibilities to the plaintiff women was merely that these women had lower work quality and lower
performance in their initial job interviews. However, upon investigation, it was found that these women had actually
scored higher than the men in the interviews. Despite that, the male employees were placed on higher career tracks
and were given higher wage bonuses as compared to the female employees. Hence, in view of above-mentioned
analysis, it is evident that that the women, if not better, but were performing at same quality levels as those of men.
Yet, the females were denied higher wages and better work responsibilities as opposed to men. All of this happened
just because of the sexist and discriminatory approach followed by the tech-giant Google. Violation of Ethical
principles 1) Dignity The company denied a basic human right of the women employees, pertaining to “Equal pay for
equal work”. According to ethical theories and perspectives, if a company respects human rights and does not
violate them, then only it is maintaining the dignity. 2) Reliability The company made a fraudulent promise of
discontinuing the discriminatory practices in 2017 but did not do anything to solve the existing such practices. The
women employees lost the reliability over the company’s promises due to non-fulfillment of their needs. 3) Fairness
The company had been doing gender based discriminationin terms of providing wage bonuses and work
responsibilities against women. The discrimination was unfair as women, despite delivering, if not better, equal
quality of work as that delivered by men, were being denied opportunities of receiving promotions and bonus wages.
4) Responsiveness The company was not serious about the concerns raised by the female employees regarding the
company’s sexist approach. The company although promised to resolve the issues, but never did anything practically
to find a solution. Even when the female employees asked the company’s management to give them a reason of not
promoting the, Google responded carelessly by saying that their work quality and the initial interview performances
were below par. Whereas, it was found later that their initial interview experiences were at times even better than
male counterparts. How to handle the situation If I were the Google’s management head, one of the major
stakeholders with respect to the entire scenario, I would have tried to control the situation before hand. In particular,
I would have stopped the eventual plaintiffs and would have tried to resolve the issue before it could reach th
court. I would have used the approach of Utilitarianism by aiming to maximize the social welfare by balancing
interest of individuals who would have been impacted by the likely consequences. In this regard, I would have got a
thorough investigation conducted into the matter. If the allegations were still found to be true, I would have planned
a model which would ensure that there would be no discriminatory practices in the office with regard to employees’
growth and bonus wages. The below stakeholder analysis would have given a clearer picture of the actions:
Stakeholders Likely Impact Short term Likely Impact Long term Google and its management Would be saved fro
court case Would maintain a greater reputation in the minds of future employees Women Employees Would be happy
and satisfied Would describe Google as an ideal work place. Further, I would have self-introspected into the fact that
whether I would be meeting my duties as a management head? That way, I would have realized that I might b
violating the principles of dignity, reliability, fairness and responsiveness (as described above) by not taking an
actions for solving the issues at hand. Thus, the above-mentioned approaches could have been used in the Google’s
case so as to benefit the society as a whole and to ensure that the justice is delivered without any delay. 1
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