Google employee loses tribunal claim after sexual harassment complaint

London Central Employment Tribunal found, external that Woodall’s alleged mistreatment was “not in any way because of, or materially influenced by,” her disclosures.

Judge Smith said this was because of insufficient evidence and the tribunal accepted Google’s explanations, which were sufficiently supported by documentary and oral evidence.

Woodall was working as a senior industry head for Google UK when a female client reported to her that a company employee, referred to as Mr O, had made inappropriate sexual comments during a business lunch in August 2022.

The client reported that Mr O, then a Google manager, had boasted about the number of black women he had had sex with, and the incident was witnessed by his line manager who did nothing to stop him.

In her claim, Woodall says she raised the client’s concerns in a meeting with her boss Matt Bush, then managing director of Google’s UK Sales and Agencies team, and the company opened an internal investigation into Mr O’s conduct.

The investigation uncovered further incidents of inappropriate behaviour and Mr O was sacked, tribunal documents show.

Woodall claimed that her boss Bush had then retaliated against her because her complaint also implicated two senior managers in the team who were his close friends.

She claimed this included swapping her successful client account with a failing one, demoting her on a big internal project, and trying to downgrade her performance, the tribunal heard.

Both senior managers were subsequently disciplined by Google for witnessing Mr O’s conduct and failing to intervene, before later being made redundant.

Georgina Halford-Hall, the chief executive of WhistleblowersUK which is supporting Woodall, commented that her case “highlighted the stark realities facing technology whistleblowers, showing the impact of inadequate protection in the courts and the absence of regulation across tech companies”.

“The implications for other women in big tech who have contacted us as a result of this case are that they are now even more afraid to speak out,” she added.