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Don't Be Evil: Bad Bosses Fake Promises and My Escape from Big Tech – A Biting Memoir of Twelve Years Inside Google
A whip-smart, funny, and timely memoir about one worker’s 12 years at Google and her journey from buying in to buying out, and being radicalized in a sea of false promises, fake work, and bad bosses.
Hugely clever and uncanny, Don't Be Evil is a biting look back at a surreal era in tech, How do we disentangle ourselves from work, when work demands our whole self? For readers of How to Do Nothing and Careless People, Stapleton's candid book grapples with what it means to find a sense of identity and power beyond our jobs, in a culture that tells us our career is who we are.
Hugely clever and uncanny, Don't Be Evil is a biting look back at a surreal era in tech, How do we disentangle ourselves from work, when work demands our whole self? For readers of How to Do Nothing and Careless People, Stapleton's candid book grapples with what it means to find a sense of identity and power beyond our jobs, in a culture that tells us our career is who we are.
276 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 4, 2026
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August 9, 2026
I was hoping this would be Careless People for Google. It was… not.
Despite constant reminders that she’d been dubbed “the bard of Google” (for writing the invitation emails to the weekly all-hands), I saw very little evidence of the supposed wit. “Saying the quiet part out loud” is one of her pet phrases, repeated at least five times. The opening chapters are strong enough, but by the halfway mark, her lack of introspection, and yes, I’ll say it, her victim mentality (!), became irksome.
She stayed at Google for twelve years, never rose past middle management, and seems to have had very little impact. Fine. But she appears to believe she was treated shockingly badly. She dealt with petty bosses, ingrained misogyny in a male-dominated industry (though she worked in marketing, which even in tech skews female), and a perceived stalling of her career after she led the Google walkout. The walkout was her idea: she sent the announcement email and continued to meet weekly with the other organizers, where, by her own account, not much else happened.
Here’s the issue. When a supervisor asked her to jump, including when it meant elevating racist YouTube figures or softening marketing copy deemed too liberal, her self-described response was “how high?” That instinct didn’t disappear once she began her “activism”. When a fellow walkout organizer, a Black woman, pushed the group to keep up the pressure after Google failed to meet the walkout’s demands, Claire demurred. She was willing to rock the boat right up to the point where it might cost her the job, and not an inch past it, which is, of course, the point where rocking the boat starts to count.
And despite treatment that reads as fairly standard corporate-America grievance, she chose to stay, year after year, with Google accommodating her department transfers, while collecting millions. A middle manager who started in the mid-aughts and stayed through 2018 would have made an enormous amount between a 200k+ salary and stock. I’d guess Google made her a millionaire several times over. When she finally quit, she got a year of severance, the equivalent of her six months of maternity leave, and reimbursement for the employment lawyer she’d consulted. Poor thing.
I believe Google, like most large American companies, lacks morals and treats its employees badly. I don’t think Claire Stapleton was one of those employees, and I don’t think she’s the revolutionary she imagines herself to be. Her central grievance seems to be: why wasn’t I celebrated, rewarded, and promoted immediately after leading the walkout? I also think it’s fairly clear she could have kept her job. She ultimately left over tension with her manager, tension that predated the walkout, to be clear, but which she feels it worsened.
I applaud her for conceiving of and initiating the walkout. But an idea and an email are where her activism starts and, as far as I can tell, where it stops. What’s left is three hundred pages of a woman who was paid extraordinarily well to be mildly inconvenienced, narrating it as persecution. Yawn. I recommend reading the NYTimes review.
Despite constant reminders that she’d been dubbed “the bard of Google” (for writing the invitation emails to the weekly all-hands), I saw very little evidence of the supposed wit. “Saying the quiet part out loud” is one of her pet phrases, repeated at least five times. The opening chapters are strong enough, but by the halfway mark, her lack of introspection, and yes, I’ll say it, her victim mentality (!), became irksome.
She stayed at Google for twelve years, never rose past middle management, and seems to have had very little impact. Fine. But she appears to believe she was treated shockingly badly. She dealt with petty bosses, ingrained misogyny in a male-dominated industry (though she worked in marketing, which even in tech skews female), and a perceived stalling of her career after she led the Google walkout. The walkout was her idea: she sent the announcement email and continued to meet weekly with the other organizers, where, by her own account, not much else happened.
Here’s the issue. When a supervisor asked her to jump, including when it meant elevating racist YouTube figures or softening marketing copy deemed too liberal, her self-described response was “how high?” That instinct didn’t disappear once she began her “activism”. When a fellow walkout organizer, a Black woman, pushed the group to keep up the pressure after Google failed to meet the walkout’s demands, Claire demurred. She was willing to rock the boat right up to the point where it might cost her the job, and not an inch past it, which is, of course, the point where rocking the boat starts to count.
And despite treatment that reads as fairly standard corporate-America grievance, she chose to stay, year after year, with Google accommodating her department transfers, while collecting millions. A middle manager who started in the mid-aughts and stayed through 2018 would have made an enormous amount between a 200k+ salary and stock. I’d guess Google made her a millionaire several times over. When she finally quit, she got a year of severance, the equivalent of her six months of maternity leave, and reimbursement for the employment lawyer she’d consulted. Poor thing.
I believe Google, like most large American companies, lacks morals and treats its employees badly. I don’t think Claire Stapleton was one of those employees, and I don’t think she’s the revolutionary she imagines herself to be. Her central grievance seems to be: why wasn’t I celebrated, rewarded, and promoted immediately after leading the walkout? I also think it’s fairly clear she could have kept her job. She ultimately left over tension with her manager, tension that predated the walkout, to be clear, but which she feels it worsened.
I applaud her for conceiving of and initiating the walkout. But an idea and an email are where her activism starts and, as far as I can tell, where it stops. What’s left is three hundred pages of a woman who was paid extraordinarily well to be mildly inconvenienced, narrating it as persecution. Yawn. I recommend reading the NYTimes review.
August 19, 2026
As a Googler who joined in 2015 and participated in the 2018 walkout, I bring a specific insider perspective to this memoir—along with the recognition that as a man, my frame of reference, privilege, and day-to-day experience differ substantially from the author's.
A LOT of reviews will compare this to Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism. They're both stories of a solitary woman with a conscience who fought against their big tech employer as the companies transformed from hippie utopias to mega-corps with outsized impacts on a global scale. While Meta fought tooth and nail to prevent publication and subsequently suppressed that book—inadvertently Streisand-effecting it to bestseller status—Alphabet/Google largely shrugged this one off.
My own reading was rather frustrating, despite some real strengths. I feel the author captured her personal life very well—the sibling bond translating to this larger-than-life moral compass looming over like a ghost as she went through her trials and tribulations was really well done. Her description of how she expressed (or didn't) her grief was visceral and exceptionally well-written.
The complaints I have with this book are threefold in main:
First, this reads very much as the author's current worldview going back and colouring her entire life's story. She was clearly not this cynical and eye-roll-y about Google's advertised idealism at the time, so reading the snide asides of 'little did I know' or 'how naive I was' bookending every single chapter got old real fast. The critical tell was that the author had zero positive things to say about *any* of the jobs she held at Google, including the role she took after almost exiting the company in 2012 and being convinced by HR to see if she wanted an internal transfer instead. She views her entire time at Google strictly through the lens of David Graeber's Bullshit Jobs: A Theory. The time period being chronicled should have carried the voice of the person as she was in that moment—it would have far better illustrated her transformation from a coddled, privileged, happy-go-lucky cog in the machine into a newly class-conscious labour organiser.
Second—and I absolutely don't mean to minimise the stream of issues the author faced—there is a real issue of proportionality when she lists the grievances she encountered:
1. A (female) consultant told her that she should not ride the Google bikes wearing a skirt. An odd comment on clothing choices and pretty sexist, but odd to hold a grudge about for fifteen years.
2. A male exec she was ghostwriting for asked her to get a drink together at an industry soirée. Before she could rebuff him (and face potential retaliation) or accept, someone else called the exec over, extricating her from the situation. A tough spot to be in, but hardly the kind of sexual harassment she later chronicled others faced.
3. A new boss did not give her specific tasks to accomplish, but asked her to be proactive, learn from others, and lend her own voice—effectively carte blanche to chart her own role. She excoriated this boss formally in internal HR channels, later post-walkout in the media, and now for a third time in this book, all for being a mildly bad manager that literally every person in corporate life encounters at least once.
4. The vitriol Christine Blasey Ford suffered during the Kavanaugh hearings. The author felt valid indignation on her behalf, but this had nothing to do with Google or her work there.
5. The Andy Rubin payoff, which spoke to the rotten environment around harassment within Google. Again, empathetic indignation suffered by the author, but much more substantive and close to home.
Lumping standard workplace friction alongside severe systemic rot weakens the narrative's central moral argument. Even the final bit of retaliation she documented from her manager, Marion, seemed thoroughly dramatised and exaggerated for effect. Marion talked about reassigning her to a lower priority project, taking away half of her reports, and hiring a new manager reporting to Marion who the author would report to. The author characterised this as a 'demotion', even though that word has a very specific meaning—reducing someone's level in the org chart—which was not happening here (per the author's own account).
Third, the sometimes blatant and incredulous sidestepping of her own incredible privilege. The author was born into a pretty wealthy family—her parents casually moved the family to send the kids to prep school and then just as casually bought a second house in Santa Barbara. The author frequently mentions the Stanford and Ivy pedigree of the conformists she met at Google and later decried, without a shade of self-reflection about her own education at UPenn (which is in the Ivy League, last I checked). As a relatively early employee, her compensation was substantial—a house in Bed-Stuy and the luxury of being essentially unemployed for the last six years. All of this is taken for granted and mentioned matter-of-factly. Some lip service is paid to other intersectional identities raising their voices in the avenues she facilitated (to cover her bases among her liberal feminist brethren), but there is zero accountability or introspection regarding where she actually fits within that intersectional hierarchy.
A LOT of reviews will compare this to Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism. They're both stories of a solitary woman with a conscience who fought against their big tech employer as the companies transformed from hippie utopias to mega-corps with outsized impacts on a global scale. While Meta fought tooth and nail to prevent publication and subsequently suppressed that book—inadvertently Streisand-effecting it to bestseller status—Alphabet/Google largely shrugged this one off.
My own reading was rather frustrating, despite some real strengths. I feel the author captured her personal life very well—the sibling bond translating to this larger-than-life moral compass looming over like a ghost as she went through her trials and tribulations was really well done. Her description of how she expressed (or didn't) her grief was visceral and exceptionally well-written.
The complaints I have with this book are threefold in main:
First, this reads very much as the author's current worldview going back and colouring her entire life's story. She was clearly not this cynical and eye-roll-y about Google's advertised idealism at the time, so reading the snide asides of 'little did I know' or 'how naive I was' bookending every single chapter got old real fast. The critical tell was that the author had zero positive things to say about *any* of the jobs she held at Google, including the role she took after almost exiting the company in 2012 and being convinced by HR to see if she wanted an internal transfer instead. She views her entire time at Google strictly through the lens of David Graeber's Bullshit Jobs: A Theory. The time period being chronicled should have carried the voice of the person as she was in that moment—it would have far better illustrated her transformation from a coddled, privileged, happy-go-lucky cog in the machine into a newly class-conscious labour organiser.
Second—and I absolutely don't mean to minimise the stream of issues the author faced—there is a real issue of proportionality when she lists the grievances she encountered:
1. A (female) consultant told her that she should not ride the Google bikes wearing a skirt. An odd comment on clothing choices and pretty sexist, but odd to hold a grudge about for fifteen years.
2. A male exec she was ghostwriting for asked her to get a drink together at an industry soirée. Before she could rebuff him (and face potential retaliation) or accept, someone else called the exec over, extricating her from the situation. A tough spot to be in, but hardly the kind of sexual harassment she later chronicled others faced.
3. A new boss did not give her specific tasks to accomplish, but asked her to be proactive, learn from others, and lend her own voice—effectively carte blanche to chart her own role. She excoriated this boss formally in internal HR channels, later post-walkout in the media, and now for a third time in this book, all for being a mildly bad manager that literally every person in corporate life encounters at least once.
4. The vitriol Christine Blasey Ford suffered during the Kavanaugh hearings. The author felt valid indignation on her behalf, but this had nothing to do with Google or her work there.
5. The Andy Rubin payoff, which spoke to the rotten environment around harassment within Google. Again, empathetic indignation suffered by the author, but much more substantive and close to home.
Lumping standard workplace friction alongside severe systemic rot weakens the narrative's central moral argument. Even the final bit of retaliation she documented from her manager, Marion, seemed thoroughly dramatised and exaggerated for effect. Marion talked about reassigning her to a lower priority project, taking away half of her reports, and hiring a new manager reporting to Marion who the author would report to. The author characterised this as a 'demotion', even though that word has a very specific meaning—reducing someone's level in the org chart—which was not happening here (per the author's own account).
Third, the sometimes blatant and incredulous sidestepping of her own incredible privilege. The author was born into a pretty wealthy family—her parents casually moved the family to send the kids to prep school and then just as casually bought a second house in Santa Barbara. The author frequently mentions the Stanford and Ivy pedigree of the conformists she met at Google and later decried, without a shade of self-reflection about her own education at UPenn (which is in the Ivy League, last I checked). As a relatively early employee, her compensation was substantial—a house in Bed-Stuy and the luxury of being essentially unemployed for the last six years. All of this is taken for granted and mentioned matter-of-factly. Some lip service is paid to other intersectional identities raising their voices in the avenues she facilitated (to cover her bases among her liberal feminist brethren), but there is zero accountability or introspection regarding where she actually fits within that intersectional hierarchy.
August 14, 2026
I don't know Claire, but my time at Google overlapped with hers, so I really resonated with her story.
She started as a fresh-faced Noogler believing that Google was a force for good in the world, and became famous within Google for her delightful weekly commentary on the TGIF company event.
Over the next decade, she became increasingly disillusioned as she saw how company executives chose to preserve Google's reputation and stock price over doing the right thing for its employees, constantly choosing to believe and protect its (mostly white, male, older) executives rather than engage seriously with the experiences of the (mostly) women who were excluded and gaslit.
Stapleton continued to hold the cognitive dissonance until the news broke of Andy Rubin (Android founder) being given a $75 million farewell bonus when leaving the company due to confirmed sexual harassment. She and others organized a Google walkout, which made headlines around the world, as thousands of employees streamed out of Google offices to support their fellow employees. And Google responded by saying a few nice words, not making any substantive changes, and eventually forcing most of the Walkout leaders, including Stapleton, to leave the company.
Stapleton tells her story with a fiery passion, as it's also a story of her learning to trust her own experience and integrity, rather than deferring to her manager or to other executives on how she should think.
I'll also say that she is not alone in her experience. I left Google of my own volition around the same time she did, partly because I had grown disillusioned myself from seeing the shift from doing the right thing to focusing on profits above all. I have talked to dozens of others who loved Google, made it part of their identity, and then were sorely disappointed that it lost that feeling over time. Google was a special place, and then it became just another big company, and Stapleton tells the story well of what it felt to experience that.
She started as a fresh-faced Noogler believing that Google was a force for good in the world, and became famous within Google for her delightful weekly commentary on the TGIF company event.
Over the next decade, she became increasingly disillusioned as she saw how company executives chose to preserve Google's reputation and stock price over doing the right thing for its employees, constantly choosing to believe and protect its (mostly white, male, older) executives rather than engage seriously with the experiences of the (mostly) women who were excluded and gaslit.
Stapleton continued to hold the cognitive dissonance until the news broke of Andy Rubin (Android founder) being given a $75 million farewell bonus when leaving the company due to confirmed sexual harassment. She and others organized a Google walkout, which made headlines around the world, as thousands of employees streamed out of Google offices to support their fellow employees. And Google responded by saying a few nice words, not making any substantive changes, and eventually forcing most of the Walkout leaders, including Stapleton, to leave the company.
Stapleton tells her story with a fiery passion, as it's also a story of her learning to trust her own experience and integrity, rather than deferring to her manager or to other executives on how she should think.
I'll also say that she is not alone in her experience. I left Google of my own volition around the same time she did, partly because I had grown disillusioned myself from seeing the shift from doing the right thing to focusing on profits above all. I have talked to dozens of others who loved Google, made it part of their identity, and then were sorely disappointed that it lost that feeling over time. Google was a special place, and then it became just another big company, and Stapleton tells the story well of what it felt to experience that.
August 8, 2026
I can't review this book objectively, and have no intention of doing so. You see, it's about my life; I was female and at Google from 2007 to 2025, covering the entire arc of this book, and many of the things described were company-wide events that touched me directly. There are emails quoted that I remembered reading when the author sent them out in 2007. There's a protest whose origins are described that I attended, and I remember what boots I wore that day and how I spoke to a local reporter with my heart in my throat (figuring that someone should, and I was one of the senior women at the site). There's a ridiculous memo discussed that I also read, and discussed, and that nearly kept me from going for my L7 promotion in 2017. The events here are corporate history but they're also vivid pieces of our lives, shared experiences for thousands of us who worked at a crazy place during a crazy time of changes.
And so, in short, I read this book in two days, with plenty of pauses for "Me too, OMG" and "I read that email when she sent it" and "I remember!" and "Ugh, preeeeeeeach." Claire and I never met each other IRL, but I'm here to tell you: that doesn't matter.
There's a story she tells of a guy being eased out of a group due to "the level thing", referenced by a person who had hired that guy and assigned him that level. The guy felt like he was going crazy; Google was always good at making you feel like you were crazy, says Claire. And yes! That happened to me too! After I'd been there a year I found out I also had a leveling problem, and also wasn't allowed to change my level, and also wasn't supposed to even respect my current level. You know, the job I'd signed an offer of permanent employment to do? That job. I felt like I was going crazy, too. And it was followed by years of me figuring it out for the most part, progressing, getting promotions and building teams, haunted by the feeling of walking up a staircase inside a building that itself was slowly sinking into the mud.
My story is not this story, but there's hella overlap, and it was not read impersonally or with detachment. Highly recommended for Googlers and ex-Googlers; I have no idea what it's like to read for anyone else, but have to think it's a bit like Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism which gives a similar treatment to Facebook.
And so, in short, I read this book in two days, with plenty of pauses for "Me too, OMG" and "I read that email when she sent it" and "I remember!" and "Ugh, preeeeeeeach." Claire and I never met each other IRL, but I'm here to tell you: that doesn't matter.
There's a story she tells of a guy being eased out of a group due to "the level thing", referenced by a person who had hired that guy and assigned him that level. The guy felt like he was going crazy; Google was always good at making you feel like you were crazy, says Claire. And yes! That happened to me too! After I'd been there a year I found out I also had a leveling problem, and also wasn't allowed to change my level, and also wasn't supposed to even respect my current level. You know, the job I'd signed an offer of permanent employment to do? That job. I felt like I was going crazy, too. And it was followed by years of me figuring it out for the most part, progressing, getting promotions and building teams, haunted by the feeling of walking up a staircase inside a building that itself was slowly sinking into the mud.
My story is not this story, but there's hella overlap, and it was not read impersonally or with detachment. Highly recommended for Googlers and ex-Googlers; I have no idea what it's like to read for anyone else, but have to think it's a bit like Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism which gives a similar treatment to Facebook.
August 9, 2026
This book is a journey, and I ended it feeling it was courageous and very well written. I could not put it down, just like Careless People. I screenshot 43 quotes from my library ebook. It was so deeply relatable.
I struggled at the start because Claire admits to her privileged childhood, and her entire career was spent at one lush company. I felt conflict with how much worse it is outside big tech, having lived both. I wanted to yell how I watched a woman at a small company save a whole year’s vacation so she could take two weeks off for the birth of her second child when she had a toddler at home as a single mom. It felt hard to see past all the perks and huge paychecks.
But stay with it. By the second half, my mood changed. She so cleanly and crisply dsecribed things I have experienced, and watched others experience, over and over through the years. The pointlessless of HR. The meaninglessness of anti-retaliation rhetoric. It’s spot-on. The gaslighting and games that are meant to make you feel or look crazy. And sadly also the women at the top that choose not to help. It’s real.
One of the most rage-inducing parts of watching people, especially women, in big tech speak up and try to make change, was watching them later meekly accept silence for a pile of money (via a non-disclosure agreement). I really, really respected that Claire saw that choice and made the other one. And also admitted she was just tired by then. Telling these stories is our only hope. Bravo.
I struggled at the start because Claire admits to her privileged childhood, and her entire career was spent at one lush company. I felt conflict with how much worse it is outside big tech, having lived both. I wanted to yell how I watched a woman at a small company save a whole year’s vacation so she could take two weeks off for the birth of her second child when she had a toddler at home as a single mom. It felt hard to see past all the perks and huge paychecks.
But stay with it. By the second half, my mood changed. She so cleanly and crisply dsecribed things I have experienced, and watched others experience, over and over through the years. The pointlessless of HR. The meaninglessness of anti-retaliation rhetoric. It’s spot-on. The gaslighting and games that are meant to make you feel or look crazy. And sadly also the women at the top that choose not to help. It’s real.
One of the most rage-inducing parts of watching people, especially women, in big tech speak up and try to make change, was watching them later meekly accept silence for a pile of money (via a non-disclosure agreement). I really, really respected that Claire saw that choice and made the other one. And also admitted she was just tired by then. Telling these stories is our only hope. Bravo.
August 22, 2026
Man, I am fascinated my these tech memoirs, even if I don’t particularly like them. Unfortunately, this was the least interesting of item I’ve tried on the long menu of similar memoirs.
My main complaint is a single word: why? Why was this written?
Stapleton’s claim to fame is two-fold. First, her initial job at Google involved writing a weekly email that went out to the entire company. For this role, she refers to herself throughout the book as the “bard of Google.” If you think people that peaked in high school are annoying, try people that peaked by sending emails. Second, she was an organizer for the 2018, Google walkout, an event to which Stapleton ascribes a Tiananman Square level of importance. Now eight years and a seismic shift in tech later, Stapleton has decided that these accolades are worthy of a memoir.
Stapleton begins the memoir with her early life story, a pretty standard tale of a privileged upbringing. She attended the School for Special Snowflakes, uhhhh, I’m sorry, the College Preparatory School, where teenagers call their teachers by their first names. After which, she attended UPenn, which she claims made her underprivileged when starting at Google due to the fact that it’s not Harvard. In her eyes Cornell alums must be untouchable scum. She goes into great detail about every boyfriend that she’s ever had because what is a woman if not an object made valuable through men. Her internalized sexism is apparent elsewhere. The women at Google that are more successful than her are not mentors or role models. Instead they are always adversaries. In one role, she’s particularly irked by her more successful coworker Natalie. Why is Natalie more successful? Maybe because she took the time and resources to obtain a masters in advertising. This is probably why Natalie magically seems to know exactly what to in her job. Yet Stapleton never turns to Natalie for advice or invests in her own development. She just complains.
Let me now return to my original question of why this memoir needed to be written. For me, the only believable reasons are ego and personal profit. Although Stapleton helped organize the walkout, that is the one and only item on her activism resume. After leaving Google, did she join an altruistic tech company? Did she join a non-profit? Did she continue to use her voice? Nope! She worked part time at companies she does not name, I assume comfortably living thanks in great part to the wealth she had accumulated from Google. Despite her willingness to share every detail from every minor slight during her time at Google, what detail does she not share? Oh right, exactly how much money she made as a Googler. During her brief time as a walkout organizer, she met many women who had suffered much greater injustice from Google. This book would have been a great opportunity to return to those connections and highlight those that actually faced discrimination at Google. Instead, for all her self mythologizing as the “bard of google,” Stapleton spins us a surprisingly bland tale.
My main complaint is a single word: why? Why was this written?
Stapleton’s claim to fame is two-fold. First, her initial job at Google involved writing a weekly email that went out to the entire company. For this role, she refers to herself throughout the book as the “bard of Google.” If you think people that peaked in high school are annoying, try people that peaked by sending emails. Second, she was an organizer for the 2018, Google walkout, an event to which Stapleton ascribes a Tiananman Square level of importance. Now eight years and a seismic shift in tech later, Stapleton has decided that these accolades are worthy of a memoir.
Stapleton begins the memoir with her early life story, a pretty standard tale of a privileged upbringing. She attended the School for Special Snowflakes, uhhhh, I’m sorry, the College Preparatory School, where teenagers call their teachers by their first names. After which, she attended UPenn, which she claims made her underprivileged when starting at Google due to the fact that it’s not Harvard. In her eyes Cornell alums must be untouchable scum. She goes into great detail about every boyfriend that she’s ever had because what is a woman if not an object made valuable through men. Her internalized sexism is apparent elsewhere. The women at Google that are more successful than her are not mentors or role models. Instead they are always adversaries. In one role, she’s particularly irked by her more successful coworker Natalie. Why is Natalie more successful? Maybe because she took the time and resources to obtain a masters in advertising. This is probably why Natalie magically seems to know exactly what to in her job. Yet Stapleton never turns to Natalie for advice or invests in her own development. She just complains.
Let me now return to my original question of why this memoir needed to be written. For me, the only believable reasons are ego and personal profit. Although Stapleton helped organize the walkout, that is the one and only item on her activism resume. After leaving Google, did she join an altruistic tech company? Did she join a non-profit? Did she continue to use her voice? Nope! She worked part time at companies she does not name, I assume comfortably living thanks in great part to the wealth she had accumulated from Google. Despite her willingness to share every detail from every minor slight during her time at Google, what detail does she not share? Oh right, exactly how much money she made as a Googler. During her brief time as a walkout organizer, she met many women who had suffered much greater injustice from Google. This book would have been a great opportunity to return to those connections and highlight those that actually faced discrimination at Google. Instead, for all her self mythologizing as the “bard of google,” Stapleton spins us a surprisingly bland tale.
September 18, 2026
Claire Stapleton is an American writer and former Google employee who joined the company in 2007 at 22, shortly after graduating from the University of Pennsylvania with a degree in English. She initially worked in internal communications at Google's Mountain View headquarters, helping produce the weekly TGIF all-hands meetings and eventually earning the tongue-in-cheek title "Bard of Google." She later transferred to the Google Creative Lab in New York and then to YouTube marketing, where she worked on social media and brand voice. After 12 years at the company, she left in 2019 following her involvement in organizing the massive 2018 Google Walkout and what she described as subsequent retaliation from management.
Don't Be Evil is largely a memoir of Stapleton's gradual transition from true believer to disillusioned employee. In Google's earlier years, she clearly bought into the idea that the company was not simply an employer but an unusually enlightened institution doing important work. Over time, however, she became increasingly frustrated by sexism, dysfunctional management, work she came to regard as essentially meaningless (prompted by learning about David Grabher's Bullshit Jobs: A Theory), and the growing distance between Google's professed values and how the company actually operated. Some of her examples are genuinely disturbing, particularly the sexual harassment and the company's handling of complaints. But I had mixed feelings about the larger narrative because Stapleton frequently seems surprised by fairly ordinary realities of large corporate organizations: that managers can be ineffective and still succeed, HR primarily protects the organization, internal politics matter, speaking publicly against an employer can damage one's career even when the underlying complaint is legitimate, and years of loyalty do not guarantee reciprocal loyalty from a corporation.
That is where this differed for me from Kristi Coulter's Exit Interview, another memoir by a woman who spent years inside a huge technology company before becoming deeply disillusioned with it. Coulter seemed considerably more circumspect about both Amazon and her own complicity in staying there. Stapleton, by contrast, can simultaneously describe much of her work as "bullshit," question the ethics of the products she was promoting, and acknowledge how generously the technology economy rewarded her, while still sounding genuinely shocked when Google eventually stopped treating her as one of its favored insiders. I don't doubt that she encountered sexism or that Google retaliated against employee activism; contemporary reporting supports significant parts of her account. What I found less convincing was the implication that the dysfunction she experienced was somehow exceptional rather than a particularly well-compensated version of dynamics that exist throughout corporate life.
The obvious comparison is Careless People, Sarah Wynn-Williams's memoir about Facebook, although Stapleton was never operating at anything like Wynn-Williams's proximity to the highest levels of corporate power. Don't Be Evil is ultimately more about what happens when someone builds a substantial part of her identity around an employer and then discovers that the employer never had the reciprocal relationship with her that she imagined. That is interesting material, but I finished the book feeling that Stapleton had developed considerably more skepticism about Google than she had about her own expectations of work.
Further reading:
Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism by Sarah Wynn-Williams
Exit Interview: The Life and Death of My Ambitious Career by Kristi Coulter
Whistleblower: My Journey to Silicon Valley and Fight for Justice at Uber by Susan Fowler
Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener
Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble by Dan Lyons
My statistics:
Book 182 for 2026
Book 2488 cumulatively
Don't Be Evil is largely a memoir of Stapleton's gradual transition from true believer to disillusioned employee. In Google's earlier years, she clearly bought into the idea that the company was not simply an employer but an unusually enlightened institution doing important work. Over time, however, she became increasingly frustrated by sexism, dysfunctional management, work she came to regard as essentially meaningless (prompted by learning about David Grabher's Bullshit Jobs: A Theory), and the growing distance between Google's professed values and how the company actually operated. Some of her examples are genuinely disturbing, particularly the sexual harassment and the company's handling of complaints. But I had mixed feelings about the larger narrative because Stapleton frequently seems surprised by fairly ordinary realities of large corporate organizations: that managers can be ineffective and still succeed, HR primarily protects the organization, internal politics matter, speaking publicly against an employer can damage one's career even when the underlying complaint is legitimate, and years of loyalty do not guarantee reciprocal loyalty from a corporation.
That is where this differed for me from Kristi Coulter's Exit Interview, another memoir by a woman who spent years inside a huge technology company before becoming deeply disillusioned with it. Coulter seemed considerably more circumspect about both Amazon and her own complicity in staying there. Stapleton, by contrast, can simultaneously describe much of her work as "bullshit," question the ethics of the products she was promoting, and acknowledge how generously the technology economy rewarded her, while still sounding genuinely shocked when Google eventually stopped treating her as one of its favored insiders. I don't doubt that she encountered sexism or that Google retaliated against employee activism; contemporary reporting supports significant parts of her account. What I found less convincing was the implication that the dysfunction she experienced was somehow exceptional rather than a particularly well-compensated version of dynamics that exist throughout corporate life.
The obvious comparison is Careless People, Sarah Wynn-Williams's memoir about Facebook, although Stapleton was never operating at anything like Wynn-Williams's proximity to the highest levels of corporate power. Don't Be Evil is ultimately more about what happens when someone builds a substantial part of her identity around an employer and then discovers that the employer never had the reciprocal relationship with her that she imagined. That is interesting material, but I finished the book feeling that Stapleton had developed considerably more skepticism about Google than she had about her own expectations of work.
Further reading:
Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism by Sarah Wynn-Williams
Exit Interview: The Life and Death of My Ambitious Career by Kristi Coulter
Whistleblower: My Journey to Silicon Valley and Fight for Justice at Uber by Susan Fowler
Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener
Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble by Dan Lyons
My statistics:
Book 182 for 2026
Book 2488 cumulatively
August 9, 2026
8/8/26: Review to come!
--
8/13/26: Here is the promised review:
It’s not often that I pick up a random book and the author is from my hometown. I knew all of her references (the Catholic school she went to, the street she lived on), which was fun!
One piece of feedback is that I feel like she downplayed her privilege. I understand why authors do this but I think it’s such a disservice to the reader. Her brother is smart so he gets into College Prep. A quick google search tells me this school is $65k a year. THIS IS HIGH SCHOOL. Lololol WHAT. So naturally the family moves to Oakland to be closer to the school and Claire attends as well. This is mentioned very casually.
She assumes she will go to Berkeley or UCLA because she’s not as smart as her brother (who picks Georgetown - out of state tuition is $75k/year). LOL. She ends up getting into Penn after applying on a whim (also $75k/year). Okay cool!
Now to the actual meat of the book:
Like I said, I’m from the East Bay like Claire. I went to Berkeley (a fraction of the cost of Penn but still an “elite-ish” school) and most of my friends from college went into tech post college. I am 7 years younger than Claire so our experiences weren’t mirrors but they were pretty close.
My overall takeaway is: sorry, but Claire are you really that naive?
My first corporate job was terrible. I realized immediately that I was a cog in a machine and that no one cared about me. I quit after 10 months. Granted I was pursuing finance, not tech, but I just never drank the Koolaid. I wanted to! I wanted to be like Claire. I’m sure if I had worked for Google, I would have felt more connected with the company and the “mission” because the culture is so enticing.
But after 10 years she is surprised that Google doesn’t love it when she organizes a walk out about how bad Google is? She is surprised that she is kicked off the promotion train? Girl, I’ve been retaliated against any time I spoke up. Unfortunately, that is the way the world works. Organizations do not want dissent. They want compliant workers!! You are replaceable! You are not special. It sucks but I’m sorry, it’s the truth.
I also wish she weaved (wove?) her grief more into her story. Maybe she really did compartmentalize that much but I wanted more humanity, more of her whole life, vs just her life at Google. (Also her parents later casually buy a home in Santa Barbara and this is mentioned as if it is totally normal to own a home in Oakland and Santa Barbara! Reminds me of when the CEO I used to work for asked if I had a second home anywhere. NOPE! I can’t afford a second home on this salary SIR! And my parents don’t have one either! Thanks for asking though - love your small talk…)
Maybe it’s because I’ve gobbled up so many of these tell alls ("Careless People” about Meta, “Exit Interview” about Amazon, “Private Equity” about hedge funds, “Uncanny Valley” about Mixpanel, etc) but this one felt particularly naive. “Careless People” was naive too. Maybe I’m just over it.
It feels cynical to say - yeah sorry the world sucks for women, deal with it. I don’t want that to be my thesis but it kind of is. If you want to succeed at a place like Google, you need to shut up and suck up. You can’t dissent. I’m sorry you just can’t.
I am sad to see that Claire hasn’t done any other work since leaving Google in 2019. Maybe that shouldn’t make me sad. Maybe I should be happy for her. But to title this “My escape from big tech” is just simply a lie. It was “how I got KICKED OUT of big tech.” It was not voluntary. She was pushed out for dissenting. Sadly, that’s the way the world works. I’d love to hear other opinions but this is just my take after leaving finance/tech after 10 years myself.
--
8/13/26: Here is the promised review:
It’s not often that I pick up a random book and the author is from my hometown. I knew all of her references (the Catholic school she went to, the street she lived on), which was fun!
One piece of feedback is that I feel like she downplayed her privilege. I understand why authors do this but I think it’s such a disservice to the reader. Her brother is smart so he gets into College Prep. A quick google search tells me this school is $65k a year. THIS IS HIGH SCHOOL. Lololol WHAT. So naturally the family moves to Oakland to be closer to the school and Claire attends as well. This is mentioned very casually.
She assumes she will go to Berkeley or UCLA because she’s not as smart as her brother (who picks Georgetown - out of state tuition is $75k/year). LOL. She ends up getting into Penn after applying on a whim (also $75k/year). Okay cool!
Now to the actual meat of the book:
Like I said, I’m from the East Bay like Claire. I went to Berkeley (a fraction of the cost of Penn but still an “elite-ish” school) and most of my friends from college went into tech post college. I am 7 years younger than Claire so our experiences weren’t mirrors but they were pretty close.
My overall takeaway is: sorry, but Claire are you really that naive?
My first corporate job was terrible. I realized immediately that I was a cog in a machine and that no one cared about me. I quit after 10 months. Granted I was pursuing finance, not tech, but I just never drank the Koolaid. I wanted to! I wanted to be like Claire. I’m sure if I had worked for Google, I would have felt more connected with the company and the “mission” because the culture is so enticing.
But after 10 years she is surprised that Google doesn’t love it when she organizes a walk out about how bad Google is? She is surprised that she is kicked off the promotion train? Girl, I’ve been retaliated against any time I spoke up. Unfortunately, that is the way the world works. Organizations do not want dissent. They want compliant workers!! You are replaceable! You are not special. It sucks but I’m sorry, it’s the truth.
I also wish she weaved (wove?) her grief more into her story. Maybe she really did compartmentalize that much but I wanted more humanity, more of her whole life, vs just her life at Google. (Also her parents later casually buy a home in Santa Barbara and this is mentioned as if it is totally normal to own a home in Oakland and Santa Barbara! Reminds me of when the CEO I used to work for asked if I had a second home anywhere. NOPE! I can’t afford a second home on this salary SIR! And my parents don’t have one either! Thanks for asking though - love your small talk…)
Maybe it’s because I’ve gobbled up so many of these tell alls ("Careless People” about Meta, “Exit Interview” about Amazon, “Private Equity” about hedge funds, “Uncanny Valley” about Mixpanel, etc) but this one felt particularly naive. “Careless People” was naive too. Maybe I’m just over it.
It feels cynical to say - yeah sorry the world sucks for women, deal with it. I don’t want that to be my thesis but it kind of is. If you want to succeed at a place like Google, you need to shut up and suck up. You can’t dissent. I’m sorry you just can’t.
I am sad to see that Claire hasn’t done any other work since leaving Google in 2019. Maybe that shouldn’t make me sad. Maybe I should be happy for her. But to title this “My escape from big tech” is just simply a lie. It was “how I got KICKED OUT of big tech.” It was not voluntary. She was pushed out for dissenting. Sadly, that’s the way the world works. I’d love to hear other opinions but this is just my take after leaving finance/tech after 10 years myself.
September 7, 2026
This book is likely to be most enjoyed by current and former Googlers because there’s so much nuance to the experience of working inside the behemoth. How do you explain the death by a thousand cuts without it all sounding trivial? How do you make people understand that all these small details and interactions actually add up to something more painful and complex? It’s like speaking another language to people who haven’t experienced it.
(Adding my anecdote to the chorus of others who had poor HR experiences while working there: I worked with a man who continuously treated me like his secretary, despite not being on the same team or even in the same reporting chain. When I finally stood up to him in a meeting that was being recorded and told him the things he was asking of me were not my “scope” — love a buzzword — he proceeded to openly talk poorly about me to the two other men on the call after I hung up. I watched the recording back later that day because I felt guilty for “talking back”. Me! Feeling bad! Only then did I see these three stooges yucking it up, acknowledging they knew it was recorded and kept going anyway! Both me and my manager reported it to HR and got…zero acknowledgement. Zero apology. He got promoted twice.)
(Adding my anecdote to the chorus of others who had poor HR experiences while working there: I worked with a man who continuously treated me like his secretary, despite not being on the same team or even in the same reporting chain. When I finally stood up to him in a meeting that was being recorded and told him the things he was asking of me were not my “scope” — love a buzzword — he proceeded to openly talk poorly about me to the two other men on the call after I hung up. I watched the recording back later that day because I felt guilty for “talking back”. Me! Feeling bad! Only then did I see these three stooges yucking it up, acknowledging they knew it was recorded and kept going anyway! Both me and my manager reported it to HR and got…zero acknowledgement. Zero apology. He got promoted twice.)
August 16, 2026
Meh, as an overall listen, the book is not particularly captivating or interesting. There’s nothing here that isn’t already captured by the average person’s average corporate workplace complaints.
Once you’re okay with listening to 7 hours of boring employee complaining, it starts to dawn on you how ridiculously privileged and seemingly clueless this author is.
It’s clear that the walkout she organized is her biggest claim to fame, probably the most notable thing she’s ever done in her life to date. I was introduced to the author from an episode of Hard Fork, and this is what they led off with in the intro to summarize her relevance, so I’m assuming not many greater feats have been accomplished. She herself describes how the walkout gave her the opportunity to do major interviews with the biggest publications and podcasters in the world. As someone who was working in marketing, how clueless do you have to be not to acknowledge that all of these interviews you did and are still doing, and even this book, are all done on the backbone of Google? And it’s all personal brand development. So under the guise of criticizing this supposedly evil corporation, she’s actually growing her own brand. That’s not activism. That’s just a pursuit of self-interest entirely for your own benefit. Not only did she take millions of dollars in compensation from this corporate giant, she took, and continues to profit from them, much more while pretending that she’s pursuing some higher moral interest.
Secondly, the phrase probably every person has heard in their life is, “All publicity is good publicity.” She keeps mentioning in the book how Google secretly HATED the walkout. I have a hard time believing that one of the world’s largest and most powerful companies couldn’t stop her if they wanted to. They surely could if it was truly damaging to their company. Instead, they acknowledged it positively both within the company and publicly. At best, Google was unbothered by or benefited from this walkout, since they get to look like a progressive employer who helps their employees express their frustrations in an organized and civilized way. How does this look to all the casual viewers of the protest? Like Google is probably a very empathetic and accepting place to work. So, great advertising campaign, perhaps your best one yet!
Her total lack of acknowledgment of my points above makes me think she’s not well versed in marketing concepts, and maybe THAT’S why her career wasn’t accelerating.
While the Google brand benefited from and probably welcomed her protest display, who I could understand being irked by it is her immediate circle of coworkers, who may perhaps be better advertisers and see exactly what she is doing, and obviously say to themselves…If you hate it so much, then leave. If you’re not leaving, then clearly you are up to something else.
She’s hoping her readers are gullible enough to see her as some brave martyr and not see through her obvious pursuit of self-interest, built entirely on the shoulders of the corporate giant she deems to be so evil.
Once you’re okay with listening to 7 hours of boring employee complaining, it starts to dawn on you how ridiculously privileged and seemingly clueless this author is.
It’s clear that the walkout she organized is her biggest claim to fame, probably the most notable thing she’s ever done in her life to date. I was introduced to the author from an episode of Hard Fork, and this is what they led off with in the intro to summarize her relevance, so I’m assuming not many greater feats have been accomplished. She herself describes how the walkout gave her the opportunity to do major interviews with the biggest publications and podcasters in the world. As someone who was working in marketing, how clueless do you have to be not to acknowledge that all of these interviews you did and are still doing, and even this book, are all done on the backbone of Google? And it’s all personal brand development. So under the guise of criticizing this supposedly evil corporation, she’s actually growing her own brand. That’s not activism. That’s just a pursuit of self-interest entirely for your own benefit. Not only did she take millions of dollars in compensation from this corporate giant, she took, and continues to profit from them, much more while pretending that she’s pursuing some higher moral interest.
Secondly, the phrase probably every person has heard in their life is, “All publicity is good publicity.” She keeps mentioning in the book how Google secretly HATED the walkout. I have a hard time believing that one of the world’s largest and most powerful companies couldn’t stop her if they wanted to. They surely could if it was truly damaging to their company. Instead, they acknowledged it positively both within the company and publicly. At best, Google was unbothered by or benefited from this walkout, since they get to look like a progressive employer who helps their employees express their frustrations in an organized and civilized way. How does this look to all the casual viewers of the protest? Like Google is probably a very empathetic and accepting place to work. So, great advertising campaign, perhaps your best one yet!
Her total lack of acknowledgment of my points above makes me think she’s not well versed in marketing concepts, and maybe THAT’S why her career wasn’t accelerating.
While the Google brand benefited from and probably welcomed her protest display, who I could understand being irked by it is her immediate circle of coworkers, who may perhaps be better advertisers and see exactly what she is doing, and obviously say to themselves…If you hate it so much, then leave. If you’re not leaving, then clearly you are up to something else.
She’s hoping her readers are gullible enough to see her as some brave martyr and not see through her obvious pursuit of self-interest, built entirely on the shoulders of the corporate giant she deems to be so evil.
August 20, 2026
This was a letdown. Very little insight into how the author’s views changed over time. It was like a switch flipped and she organized a walkout (which she appears to have taken more credit for than she was due). It also genuinely appeared surprising to her that the company would not take kindly to her actions, regardless of the laws preventing retaliation.
August 29, 2026
After reading this, I feel like I need to dock a star from Careless People because this was better. The author is a much better writer (see her job title) and generally more self-aware and discerning. I hate to compare books but it’s hard not to when this one and CP are so similar. It’s similar bad corporate culture but I think the narrative is spun better here in that the reader can see how she goes from C-suite darling to enemy number one. She’s also more aware of her complicity in it all, which worked better. It’s also a more interesting read as though it was similar to CP about the toxic bad actors who ruined her corporate career, it gave more background on the workings of such a grandiose company and its own complicity in swallowing the airy fake mantras and how easy and unknowingly it could become the type of corporation it originally vowed it wouldn’t become. One star removed on pacing because some parts were too drawn out while others that I thought could have used more meat were quickly passed over. Great read overall, though.
August 31, 2026
Stapleton seems to have the kind of righteous rage that comes from a lifetime of unexamined privilege and its attendant entitlement; fury against the Google establishment that only someone who deeply adored and felt excluded from it could have. Throughout, I got the impression that the real injustice she was fighting was that she felt she deserved more power and praise for her cleverness.
I should have stopped reading after the last page of the second chapter, where she does a great job—seemingly unwittingly—of contextualizing her role in the Google walkout and summing up the real theme of her story:
“… I was too caught up in all the potential gold stars—or the bigger golden ticket, being one of those self-actualized work people.
One summer I discovered my brother was making $1.50 to my fifty cents an hour. I confronted my dad and his partner, Stu Beattie, an old school, Stanford business MBA, all boys-club preppy, in a stiff colored shirt. I wrote and delivered a passionate presentation, including drawings of my brother doing Game Boy while I toiled at a desk.
‘This isn’t just sexism,’ I said, ‘it’s child labor. So make it right.’
They were openly tickled by this.
‘She’s management material,’ Stu said, nudging my dad. ‘She’ll be running the place in no time.’
They never corrected the wage gap (this was probably one of my dad‘s ironclad management principles: Never give in to employee demands). My anger didn’t linger though; the big show and its reception was its own form of payment.”
Nearly ten years on from a walkout that ended with a whimper, this book is another vanity project that doesn’t amount to much.
I should have stopped reading after the last page of the second chapter, where she does a great job—seemingly unwittingly—of contextualizing her role in the Google walkout and summing up the real theme of her story:
“… I was too caught up in all the potential gold stars—or the bigger golden ticket, being one of those self-actualized work people.
One summer I discovered my brother was making $1.50 to my fifty cents an hour. I confronted my dad and his partner, Stu Beattie, an old school, Stanford business MBA, all boys-club preppy, in a stiff colored shirt. I wrote and delivered a passionate presentation, including drawings of my brother doing Game Boy while I toiled at a desk.
‘This isn’t just sexism,’ I said, ‘it’s child labor. So make it right.’
They were openly tickled by this.
‘She’s management material,’ Stu said, nudging my dad. ‘She’ll be running the place in no time.’
They never corrected the wage gap (this was probably one of my dad‘s ironclad management principles: Never give in to employee demands). My anger didn’t linger though; the big show and its reception was its own form of payment.”
Nearly ten years on from a walkout that ended with a whimper, this book is another vanity project that doesn’t amount to much.
September 4, 2026
mmmm...I don't know how to evaluate this one.
As a portrait of a Millennial ethos and blind spots that I think are important - in this day and age - to understand, I'd call it a must-read.
As an insider look at working at Goolge, written by someone very likeable and with whom I would almost definitely be friends, very good.
As an argument for why you should turn against Google and Big Tech and be appalled by their unfair labor practices? Total fail.
Suffice it to say, it is very hard to take seriously claims of labor injustice by someone who leaves her free Google massage to go organize and is, generally speaking, exceptionally well-paid for what sounds like a kind of pointless job. Moreover, as an outsider, it reads like Google has gone out of its way to create jobs for women and minorities despite their not having the training to be profit-center engineers. The argument for the "boys club" she experience on one team is, moreover, somewhat negated by the very clear "girls club" she then joined, both of which feel at the very least equally toxic to me.
When she talks about Google, in response to her internal labor organizing, being reached out to by HR who suggests she needs some time off for mental health, I'm kind of like a) what a kind and incredibly generous place to work; and b) they seem to have a pretty good read on the situation - I know it's sacrilege to say, but her own telling reads to me like a woman who is SUPER TIRED from early motherhood and who, as often happens in one's thirities, is confronting totally normal issues of the meaningfulness of one's work within a large organization.
The real kicker, though, was one instance where, upon organizing, one of the Black girls in the group drops out, saying that Claire doesn'trealize how much she is jeaopardizing the work this girl and others like her have been doing to do to create real and sustainable change. It is one sentence in the whole book, but is, to me, the everything point: a very privileged white girl conflates mid-career, post-motherhood doubts about work's meaning and generalized frustration with large organizational dynamics with hot topic discrimination and labor concerns - she gets impulsively fired up and makes a stink, thereby undermining the work of those who actually have things to complain about and, then quits in triumphant fury, leaving those who don't have the options she does to clean up her mess.
In short: golden handcuffs are not the same thing as oppression. and shame on your editor adn fellow readers for not pointing out the blind spots that make you come off as a very naive and privileged usurper of legitimate problesms in teh corporate world.
As a portrait of a Millennial ethos and blind spots that I think are important - in this day and age - to understand, I'd call it a must-read.
As an insider look at working at Goolge, written by someone very likeable and with whom I would almost definitely be friends, very good.
As an argument for why you should turn against Google and Big Tech and be appalled by their unfair labor practices? Total fail.
Suffice it to say, it is very hard to take seriously claims of labor injustice by someone who leaves her free Google massage to go organize and is, generally speaking, exceptionally well-paid for what sounds like a kind of pointless job. Moreover, as an outsider, it reads like Google has gone out of its way to create jobs for women and minorities despite their not having the training to be profit-center engineers. The argument for the "boys club" she experience on one team is, moreover, somewhat negated by the very clear "girls club" she then joined, both of which feel at the very least equally toxic to me.
When she talks about Google, in response to her internal labor organizing, being reached out to by HR who suggests she needs some time off for mental health, I'm kind of like a) what a kind and incredibly generous place to work; and b) they seem to have a pretty good read on the situation - I know it's sacrilege to say, but her own telling reads to me like a woman who is SUPER TIRED from early motherhood and who, as often happens in one's thirities, is confronting totally normal issues of the meaningfulness of one's work within a large organization.
The real kicker, though, was one instance where, upon organizing, one of the Black girls in the group drops out, saying that Claire doesn'trealize how much she is jeaopardizing the work this girl and others like her have been doing to do to create real and sustainable change. It is one sentence in the whole book, but is, to me, the everything point: a very privileged white girl conflates mid-career, post-motherhood doubts about work's meaning and generalized frustration with large organizational dynamics with hot topic discrimination and labor concerns - she gets impulsively fired up and makes a stink, thereby undermining the work of those who actually have things to complain about and, then quits in triumphant fury, leaving those who don't have the options she does to clean up her mess.
In short: golden handcuffs are not the same thing as oppression. and shame on your editor adn fellow readers for not pointing out the blind spots that make you come off as a very naive and privileged usurper of legitimate problesms in teh corporate world.
August 31, 2026
1. This is a vanity project from a privileged employee of Google who did not have an important role.
2. The writing is terrible; hint italicize sparingly or never.
3. Google how to forget you read this.
2. The writing is terrible; hint italicize sparingly or never.
3. Google how to forget you read this.
September 7, 2026
This is a fairly quick read about an uncomfortable topic, perhaps less well known because an egotistic head of the company didn't try to block its publication. In short, it was good, but not great.
That is pretty much how I started my review of Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism, and comparisons are inevitable. Like that book, this contains a lot of information about company internals. In contrast, the authors had very different roles - Ms. Stapleton focused on internal communication, Ms. Wynn-Williams focused on external diplomacy. Both suffered from sexism and severe situations, both were able to write these books, which in both cases tell only one side of the story. In both cases, a story of disillusionment with the company.
So why isn't Don't Be Evil a five star book for this reader? Complaints about Claire's supervisor Marion are intermingled with issues about the company culture - both dealt with indirectly. Separating these would have made for a stronger message. Agreeing with another reviewer, the other problem I have is the current author worldview coming through while giving the history - aka too many "little did I know" statements.
Both of these books were important to read, and both were very personal memoires. It is likely I would have derived more enjoyment from reading a complete history, but those haven't been written yet.
Interesting addenda - both books came from the library. Careless People was shelved at 302.32, the category for Social Interaction. Don't Be Evil was shelved instead at 338.761025, the category for "Production", which seems strange to me. The general 300 holds Social Science, so both books fit there.
That is pretty much how I started my review of Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism, and comparisons are inevitable. Like that book, this contains a lot of information about company internals. In contrast, the authors had very different roles - Ms. Stapleton focused on internal communication, Ms. Wynn-Williams focused on external diplomacy. Both suffered from sexism and severe situations, both were able to write these books, which in both cases tell only one side of the story. In both cases, a story of disillusionment with the company.
So why isn't Don't Be Evil a five star book for this reader? Complaints about Claire's supervisor Marion are intermingled with issues about the company culture - both dealt with indirectly. Separating these would have made for a stronger message. Agreeing with another reviewer, the other problem I have is the current author worldview coming through while giving the history - aka too many "little did I know" statements.
Both of these books were important to read, and both were very personal memoires. It is likely I would have derived more enjoyment from reading a complete history, but those haven't been written yet.
Interesting addenda - both books came from the library. Careless People was shelved at 302.32, the category for Social Interaction. Don't Be Evil was shelved instead at 338.761025, the category for "Production", which seems strange to me. The general 300 holds Social Science, so both books fit there.
August 15, 2026
(Read as an audiobook.) Compulsively reading tell-all books about institutions in my life (Meta, Stanford, Google).
Enjoyed this book, it was quite well-written in my opinion! The author has a compelling and relatable voice. The portions about her relationship with her brother Scott touched me most. The rest of the workplace dramas (unfortunately) failed to surprise me — it sounded like classic corporate America shenanigans to me…as much as I dislike it.
This book spoke to a question that’s been on my mind in the wake of #MeToo, George Floyd and BLM, No Kings, and the like. How does structural, institutional change happen, really? When is activism productive vs. counterproductive to its goals? How does an individual use their power for good within the strictures of our society?
Enjoyed this book, it was quite well-written in my opinion! The author has a compelling and relatable voice. The portions about her relationship with her brother Scott touched me most. The rest of the workplace dramas (unfortunately) failed to surprise me — it sounded like classic corporate America shenanigans to me…as much as I dislike it.
This book spoke to a question that’s been on my mind in the wake of #MeToo, George Floyd and BLM, No Kings, and the like. How does structural, institutional change happen, really? When is activism productive vs. counterproductive to its goals? How does an individual use their power for good within the strictures of our society?
September 1, 2026
My time at Google (2005 - 2015) overlapped with the author and I remember her emails about the weekly town hall which were witty and creative. Many of us looked forward to them and she was sort of a celeb within the company as she indicates when she talks about being called "the bard of google." She really captures the spell Google had us all under in the early days. I was interested to read about the walk out she led, which happened after I left. I hear from friends who are still working there that it's not the company it once was, but this book makes you realize, maybe it really never was, and we googlers drank the kool aid. That being said, I am grateful for my decade there, proud of the work I did, and happy to still have some great friends from that era. I feel the book slowed down for me when it got too much into her problems with various managers and she comes off as entitled and whiny at times (while not really acknowledging her economic privilege she grew up with). This is a quick read and a must-read for googlers of that era. It allowed me to have a fun book club meet up with some of my Google friends to compare notes. It's also interesting for those who may just be interested in what life is like inside Big Tech.
August 9, 2026
If this were funny, it went over my head. That's OK though, it's hard to convey comedy by means of print. I like her slogan of "Don't Be Evil," and that is perfect for some people. Meanwhile, I feel like I am relatively able to save the cats who became evil over the course of their lives by no fault of their own. For example, arthritis makes anyone a killjoy.
So I thought this was OK.
So I thought this was OK.
August 19, 2026
Really enjoyed this. The standout parts were the reflections on her brother and the difficulties she experienced with her direct leaders as opposed to the details shared about Google/Google’s leadership as a whole, which I think we all know to be pretty heinous.
August 25, 2026
Really good writer, certainly topical, unique situation given Google’s reputation early on.
August 9, 2026
I was at Google during these years and can say that the environment is perfectly captured, especially the way the company sold itself, internally and externally. At its core this is a story about how the cell protects itself, how big institutions close ranks to survive. We need people to chronicle the experience and call out what’s really happening because it’s subtle and subversive. I really liked this book as a memoir, too, outside of the setting and the story itself. You’ll read it in a weekend and be very glad you did.
August 27, 2026
decided i would read this after hearing claire stapleton talk on hardfork podcast
nothing groundbreaking unless you have never worked a corporate job and genuinely thought that the best way to bring good to the world was work at any corporate company. majority of people know corporate is full of bullshit. did not give it one star bc it wasnt difficult to read, but it was pretty damn boring and uninsightful.
maybe an OKAY read at best for someone early in their career and has little to no understanding of how corporate politics works.
nothing groundbreaking unless you have never worked a corporate job and genuinely thought that the best way to bring good to the world was work at any corporate company. majority of people know corporate is full of bullshit. did not give it one star bc it wasnt difficult to read, but it was pretty damn boring and uninsightful.
maybe an OKAY read at best for someone early in their career and has little to no understanding of how corporate politics works.
Read
September 16, 2026The rating here doesn't matter, because Stapleton's story isn't her story. It's everyone's story.
Reading this book was echo after echo from my life, the lives of those around me, the life of the entire world, the life of the world to come. The specifics are engaging in this instance, absolutely; everyone is more aware than ever that Silicon Valley is populated by scumfucks looking to grasp power and money and future scumfucks who will one day sell out their principles when it's their turn to ascend. Stapleton had no choice to get out, and good for her if she thinks she was able to save her soul. Better late than never, right?
But what this story is really about, and what every story is about these days, is just power. Those who achieve it and subvert all their better angels to keep it. The story we've been telling ourselves since the dawn of human consciousness, I suppose.
Google has moved on from what's relayed in this book to focus on AI, but I'm sure the same things are still happening somewhere inside its massive walls. All the news can talk about this last week is the incessant hand-wringing over whether the AI will kill us all, and if the AI companies can't say specifically how it will happen is the threat real (ignoring Occam's Razor entirely: AI is a misinformation engine, copying and repeating and elaborating on the conspiracies and lies that have become the bedrock of the internet endlessly and with-ever greater rapidity until that misinformation inflames political rhetoric somewhere in the world and triggers an actual conflict, which will eventually lead to all-out nuclear war). It probably doesn't matter, too many idiots out there using AI will all most likely hasten the environmental apocalypse first and cook us alive. But the heads of the AI companies insist it's inevitable, because it has become a lynchpin in America's fake economy. It's their avenue to power, and they don't want to see power shift to whatever comes next and leave them behind.
It's the same story in my province and west of here, where conservative governments consumed with ideology refuse to see the climate crisis for what it is and drag coal energy production back to the forefront for a couple more decades because it's somehow the path of least resistance. And our province's government just announced a deal to expand an AI data centre fourfold, grasping for 1.2 gigawatts of energy consumption at full buildout, located right outside the borders of our capital city. Have they done studies or consultation to understand the impact or implications or public desire for such a thing? Of course not. Have they spent at least a week or two producing slick promotional videos starring our premier, talking about how this is actually creating data sovereignty that will protect Canada and aren't we just like the Boston Bruins sticking it to those lousy Easterners in Montreal, and isn't that noble (ignoring that US servers will be housed in the same facility, doesn't feel super-sovereign, but what do I know)? The end result of a long-in-the-tooth government making excuses because it prizes economic development above all else, because as long as some money is flowing into our borders they think they'll be able to retain their power. Gotta hold on to that power, no matter what happens to the people or the planet.
The same story federally, where a once-promising Liberal Prime Minister is making gigantic, business-focused policy changes that weren't in his election platform because in a trade war anything goes, I guess. He sure looks good standing up to Trump, and if rich people get even more rich that's good, money and power staying in and increasing in Canada, right?
The same story in America, where government has now been completely subsumed into the scumbag grift and the President and everyone connected to him uses its levers to amass ever more personal and family wealth wherever they can scrounge it, saying literally anything, true or untrue, if it fits the moment, the power makes them invincible, so far.
As if power will save them. As if it will save anyone, in the end.
And yes, a government town, be it Regina or Ottawa or Washington, might as well be Google, workers just like Stapleton, afraid that if they say anything about the questionable choices they see being made in those halls of power their ability to make an earning will be snatched away. Or worse, that nobody will care and it will all be for naught. Odds are good it's the latter.
It has felt like the entire world is taking crazy pills since at least COVID, if not sooner. When will it end? What will power have to look like for things to start getting better? I sure hope we find out, but I'm not holding my breath.
Reading this book was echo after echo from my life, the lives of those around me, the life of the entire world, the life of the world to come. The specifics are engaging in this instance, absolutely; everyone is more aware than ever that Silicon Valley is populated by scumfucks looking to grasp power and money and future scumfucks who will one day sell out their principles when it's their turn to ascend. Stapleton had no choice to get out, and good for her if she thinks she was able to save her soul. Better late than never, right?
But what this story is really about, and what every story is about these days, is just power. Those who achieve it and subvert all their better angels to keep it. The story we've been telling ourselves since the dawn of human consciousness, I suppose.
Google has moved on from what's relayed in this book to focus on AI, but I'm sure the same things are still happening somewhere inside its massive walls. All the news can talk about this last week is the incessant hand-wringing over whether the AI will kill us all, and if the AI companies can't say specifically how it will happen is the threat real (ignoring Occam's Razor entirely: AI is a misinformation engine, copying and repeating and elaborating on the conspiracies and lies that have become the bedrock of the internet endlessly and with-ever greater rapidity until that misinformation inflames political rhetoric somewhere in the world and triggers an actual conflict, which will eventually lead to all-out nuclear war). It probably doesn't matter, too many idiots out there using AI will all most likely hasten the environmental apocalypse first and cook us alive. But the heads of the AI companies insist it's inevitable, because it has become a lynchpin in America's fake economy. It's their avenue to power, and they don't want to see power shift to whatever comes next and leave them behind.
It's the same story in my province and west of here, where conservative governments consumed with ideology refuse to see the climate crisis for what it is and drag coal energy production back to the forefront for a couple more decades because it's somehow the path of least resistance. And our province's government just announced a deal to expand an AI data centre fourfold, grasping for 1.2 gigawatts of energy consumption at full buildout, located right outside the borders of our capital city. Have they done studies or consultation to understand the impact or implications or public desire for such a thing? Of course not. Have they spent at least a week or two producing slick promotional videos starring our premier, talking about how this is actually creating data sovereignty that will protect Canada and aren't we just like the Boston Bruins sticking it to those lousy Easterners in Montreal, and isn't that noble (ignoring that US servers will be housed in the same facility, doesn't feel super-sovereign, but what do I know)? The end result of a long-in-the-tooth government making excuses because it prizes economic development above all else, because as long as some money is flowing into our borders they think they'll be able to retain their power. Gotta hold on to that power, no matter what happens to the people or the planet.
The same story federally, where a once-promising Liberal Prime Minister is making gigantic, business-focused policy changes that weren't in his election platform because in a trade war anything goes, I guess. He sure looks good standing up to Trump, and if rich people get even more rich that's good, money and power staying in and increasing in Canada, right?
The same story in America, where government has now been completely subsumed into the scumbag grift and the President and everyone connected to him uses its levers to amass ever more personal and family wealth wherever they can scrounge it, saying literally anything, true or untrue, if it fits the moment, the power makes them invincible, so far.
As if power will save them. As if it will save anyone, in the end.
And yes, a government town, be it Regina or Ottawa or Washington, might as well be Google, workers just like Stapleton, afraid that if they say anything about the questionable choices they see being made in those halls of power their ability to make an earning will be snatched away. Or worse, that nobody will care and it will all be for naught. Odds are good it's the latter.
It has felt like the entire world is taking crazy pills since at least COVID, if not sooner. When will it end? What will power have to look like for things to start getting better? I sure hope we find out, but I'm not holding my breath.
August 26, 2026
Although I don’t work in tech, Don’t Be Evil really resonated with me.
Claire Stapleton’s memoir charts her journey from enthusiastic Google employee - once nicknamed the “Bard of Google” - to helping organise the 2018 walkout of 20,000 employees protesting the company’s handling of sexual misconduct allegations, and ultimately leaving the company altogether.
What I found most compelling wasn’t necessarily the Big Tech exposé, but Stapleton’s exploration of workplace culture: what happens when your job becomes part of your identity, when questioning the system makes you the problem, and when a company’s carefully cultivated values don’t quite match the reality of working there.
Her reflections on grief, particularly the death of her brother Scott and the way she buried herself in work afterwards, add a deeply personal dimension to the story.
I occasionally wanted the book to zoom out further and explore the wider implications of Big Tech’s power and culture, but perhaps that’s not really the book Stapleton set out to write. This is ultimately a very personal reckoning with a workplace she once loved and believed in.
Thought-provoking, relatable and a little unsettling - especially because so much of it extends well beyond the tech industry.
Claire Stapleton’s memoir charts her journey from enthusiastic Google employee - once nicknamed the “Bard of Google” - to helping organise the 2018 walkout of 20,000 employees protesting the company’s handling of sexual misconduct allegations, and ultimately leaving the company altogether.
What I found most compelling wasn’t necessarily the Big Tech exposé, but Stapleton’s exploration of workplace culture: what happens when your job becomes part of your identity, when questioning the system makes you the problem, and when a company’s carefully cultivated values don’t quite match the reality of working there.
Her reflections on grief, particularly the death of her brother Scott and the way she buried herself in work afterwards, add a deeply personal dimension to the story.
I occasionally wanted the book to zoom out further and explore the wider implications of Big Tech’s power and culture, but perhaps that’s not really the book Stapleton set out to write. This is ultimately a very personal reckoning with a workplace she once loved and believed in.
Thought-provoking, relatable and a little unsettling - especially because so much of it extends well beyond the tech industry.
August 5, 2026
I watched Claire in a YouTube video recently (oh, I guess that's kinda ironic in retrospect) being interviewed by The Atlantic, and I basically preordered the audiobook right afterwards.
Listened to the audiobook in a day.
I'm very grateful that Claire got to tell her story, as she was so trampled over by a megacorp. For every one of these kinds of books we get, there are countless other instances of people having similar experiences that never get shared.
I'm not sure who I'd recommend this book to specifically. But it's definitely a 5 star for me, and I think the author narrating the audiobook added to the experience.
Listened to the audiobook in a day.
I'm very grateful that Claire got to tell her story, as she was so trampled over by a megacorp. For every one of these kinds of books we get, there are countless other instances of people having similar experiences that never get shared.
I'm not sure who I'd recommend this book to specifically. But it's definitely a 5 star for me, and I think the author narrating the audiobook added to the experience.
September 2, 2026
If you want to spend a few hours hearing a highly paid SF elite pretend that she has an incredible story to tell that NO ONE else has experienced, then this is your book! Its not that she has nothing important to say, its just gross to center such a privileged person who, comparatively really did not experience the actual crushing weight of labor and capitalism, act as if they are Lenin. I wonder if a single mom working two jobs in this system would ever be able to tell her story in this detail.
September 5, 2026
Related to so much of this book as a woman who also left big tech after many years. Claire’s journey from enthusiastic employee who believed in tech’s promise to do good to disillusioned and burnt out victim of just another shareholder obsessed mega corporation was all too familiar. I wish I’d had the courage to speak out in my own situation- kudos to her for her bravery and refusal to bow down to the system.
September 7, 2026
A story that reflects the type of people I worked with at Google: smart and (more often than not) naive. Clearly I'm quite jaded after a career in big tech, but what surprises me most about this book isn't Google's behavior - but the author's surprise at the consequences for speaking out against your employer. HR is there for the company, not for you the employee.
I wish it was different. I'm always surprised when employees are surprised.
I wish it was different. I'm always surprised when employees are surprised.
August 16, 2026
Well, I read this book in four hours, so I would say it has to be a five-star review. Claire, you are a bard, and your voice deserves to be heard by all of us. I am so deeply sorry that you had to crawl through the misogynistic muck to write this book for us all, but I am hoping there are “many, many more” joyous tomes in your future.
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