2021 Diversity Annual Report

A conversation with Melonie Parker, Pedro Pina, and john a. powell

Melonie Parker (Chief Diversity Officer at Google), Pedro Pina (Vice President of Global Sales at Google), and john a. powell (Director of the Othering & Belonging Institute at UC Berkeley)

Why is belonging important at Google?

john: When we think about it, everyone has a sense of belonging whether it’s to a family or a community or a church, a synagogue, a mosque, but oftentimes it’s predicated on the notion that we belong and those people don’t. And so what we’re talking about is belonging without othering, where people belong at multiple levels, but everyone belongs and so no one is other. Everyone is in the circle of human concern. That’s what we’re striving for, and I think Google is a really wonderful platform and company to advance that.

Melonie: I love how you frame that, john. When I think about belonging, I think about the different spaces where I’ve been invited into or been the only person who looks like me, but being welcomed in those spaces is something different than being invited. And that’s really the journey that we’re on at Google.

john: No, I think that’s extremely important. And it’s not just people who look like you, right? It’s also many people would not have had the experience you have. Can we recognize that we’re all human? Not all situated the same, but can we create a world in which our shared humanity becomes real? Can we create a world where we all belong? But if we can begin to listen to each other and hear each other, and then to think about what can we do in terms of our structures, our products, our policies, to actually make this future real? Corporations like Google are being called upon to do more.

Pedro: The mission of Google has never been more relevant than today. Think about it: organizing the world’s information and making it universally accessible and useful. And when we think about the words universally accessible — this is the ultimate definition of inclusivity. And we are far from being perfect, but we are making a journey in terms of trying to make our products as available and accessible as to as many people as possible, to make sure that the internet could work for everyone irrespective of location, language you speak, or digital proficiency.

What are some of the responsibilities Google has?

john: One of our big issues in the world today is knowledge. Can we really make it available to all humans in a responsible way? If you’re going to make things available to everyone and for people to really co-create, it’s not just going to happen. It has to really be deliberate, and you have to work on it.

Pedro: If we are to be producing services that are for everyone, we need to look at ourselves and we need to see our users in ourselves. And it’s a marathon — it takes a while to get there — but the level of commitment that I see across management, across the business, to make it work is very, very impressive.

Melonie: It’s so important that the lived experiences of every person in our workforce is the same or at parity, and I think it’s so different than taking the approach of equality, which has that broad brush. That step further is equity. To really go to what’s the unique or customized strategy that’s needed across all of the communities that we serve at Google, across our users, etc.

john: And we’ve understood from the very beginning that people who are situated differently, fairness and equality requires you treat them differently. And so I could be saying we have to pay attention to how people are situated, to look at communities that have been left behind, that have been underfunded, but not to the exclusion of other groups. The point is that we learn from each other, and part of having people come in is not coming in as guests. We want your full self. We want you to help shape the company, help us learn, bring what you have to the table.

What has Google learned?

Pedro: As much as we like to think about the idea of having a diversity and inclusion and belonging strategy globally, we also understand that the tensions that exist and need to be mended will differ and will change significantly when you look at them on a local level. So having leaders locally that understand what kind of representation do they need to have in our local operations in order to develop a truly inclusive culture is absolutely critical, and arming our leaders with that skill set and that capability and that sensitivity is absolutely critical.

Melonie: Yes, I want to make sure that we’re not setting boundaries between the U.S. and outside of the U.S., that we are really co-creating our future together. And I think, john, that’s what you would say is really core to belonging — is that we kind of knit the fabric of the quilt together. And one of the ways that we’re trying to get really close to what’s happening locally is by developing country plans, and so we’re looking at not just what each region needs, but what does each country need? And when we think about the underrepresented Googlers, what does underrepresented really mean across each of the countries that we serve?

Pedro: Well, we have to have the courage to have the conversations, and I believe that leaders really have to be role models here. Leaders have to be vulnerable. They themselves have to admit where they failed, and they themselves have to create the space for others to fail. At the same time, pointing in the direction of how each and every one of their team members can find the resources to progress and evolve. Systemic biases and systemic racism manifest not in so much big moments, but also in small moments. It’s funny ... as a dad … the implications of becoming a dad were huge for me as an executive because as a dad you all of a sudden realize that you’re actually shaping the life of a human being, and you are shaping the way they have to look at the world. You’re shaping their value system, and you realize that the education process is a process full of biases where they all creep in as well. The language you use, the imagery you use — it’s all in there. All of that becomes incredibly salient for you, and you have to develop mechanisms to actually act on it to make sure that you deliver against the vision that you have for your own daughter. We have to be thorough in the way we revise our projects. We have to be systemic in the way we address systemic issues, and that’s why I think this is a long process.

Melonie: But there’s also the reality of standing in the work because the work that we’re doing is structural, and when you stand in the work and you get closer to the root cause of the work, there’s more to be done, because at each step we understand more of what we need to get there and we’re very committed until it gets done. I think where we’ve done really well is the holistic strategy, that we’ve really integrated across our business to focus on representation. So the very simple formula that says hiring minus attrition, so that we’re really looking at net gains and we’re looking at who we’re hiring, who we’re partnered with to hire, where we’re sourcing our talent. And then making sure that as Googlers exit our company, are they doing that at parity or are we seeing some groups exiting more than others? And when we do find that, we are going deeper to figure out localized strategies to the communities to find out what we need to do. We recognize the platform that we have and the brand position that we have, and we know that there are other companies that are watching us, looking at us. And we want to make sure that we don’t just show our successes, but that we show the areas that we need to get better as well.

How do you feel about the future of this work?

john: If we’re going to sustain this, we have to make it sustainable and create institutions, cultures, possibilities. So I hope that we are starting to be more bridge builders, being more deliberate both at the institutional level as well as the personal level. These problems are going to be with us for a while, but I hope we see more expressions of bridging, more expressions of empathy, and, frankly, I’m hoping that Google’s space in this is more robust internally and externally.

Pedro: What makes me hopeful is the fact that I know the leaders at Google get it. They know the journey ahead of us. They know what we know; they know what we don’t know. But they are prepared to make the right investment and certainly understanding that this is a learning process that will make Google a better organization in the future.

Melonie: I completely agree with you. I am heartened by the executive leadership at Google, and I’m really encouraged by this and I find incredible hope there too