Google employees criticize CEO for “dumpster fire” response to ChatGPT

Enlarge / Google's corporate headquarters. (credit: Alex Tai | SOPA Images | LightRocket | Getty Images)

When Google's ChatGPT competitor event was announced for last week, we wrote that it seemed like a rush job designed to reassure investors, and since then, that event happened and went worse than anyone could have imagined. Google's event did the opposite of what it wanted, with the stock down nearly 12 percent since the recent high just before the event. Even Google employees are starting to take notice, with CNBC's Jennifer Elias writing that, internally, employees are criticizing CEO Sundar Pichai for what they call a ‘rushed, botched’ announcement of Google's new chatbot.

CNBC says it was able to view several messages from Google's internal "Memegen" employee forum, and while these are normally lighthearted, the report says "the posts after the Bard announcement struck a more serious tone and even went directly after Pichai."

“Dear Sundar," started one post, "the Bard launch and the layoffs were rushed, botched, and myopic. Please return to taking a long-term outlook.” Another highly upvoted post said, "Sundar, and leadership, deserve a Perf NI. They are being comically short sighted and un-Googlely in their pursuit of ‘sharpening focus.’” A "Perf NI" refers to the lowest employee performance rating of "Needs Improvement," as if anyone rates Pichai's performance as CEO.

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