Google Workers Unhappy With Salary Hike Vent At All-Hands Meeting

Google employees are unhappy with the salary hike received this year and have made it known to the upper hierarchy during a recent all-hands meeting, according to a report in Business Insider. Employees complained that they saw smaller pay bumps in compensation packages for 2025 despite the company posting strong financial performance.

The issue was raised in a company all-hands on Tuesday (Mar 25), according to a transcript of the meeting. During Google's monthly TGIF (Thank God It's Friday) meetings, employees are allowed to submit questions and vote for the ones they want to ask the most.

This month, one of the top-asked questions was why some employees had seen a decrease in their refreshed stock grants and overall compensation. Notably, Google's compensation package usually consists of base salary, equity awards and in some instances, bonuses.

John Casey, the company's vice president for global compensation and benefits told employees that over 80 per cent of the staff saw a year-on-year increase in their 2025 compensation. He, however, added that some workers employed in less technical roles received smaller equity packages to calibrate pay to local markets.

"Casey said that Google wanted to pay employees who made an impact and that the compensation structure was set up to reward high performers," the report highlighted.

This year's salary hike mirrors the pattern observed last year where some employees reported base pay increases lower than three per cent, compared to historical increases of 8-10 per cent.

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Google seeks efficiency

In December last year, Google laid off 10 per cent of its managerial staff as part of a long-running campaign to increase efficiency. Alphabet Inc.-owned Google launched its efficiency drive in September 2022.

In an open letter to employees then, CEO Sundar Pichai took "full responsibility for the decisions that led us here", but said the company had to fuel preceding periods of dramatic growth".

In the same meeting, Mr Pichai also spoke about a transformation of the corporate culture and the need to redefine its "Googleyness" - a rather vague term that has meant many things over the years, but is commonly understood as expressing what Google looks for in potential hires.