Fired from Google after 13 years of service, he used his severance to build a business around helping others with their careers

Google laid off thousands of employees in 2023 and many found their lives turned upside down with just an email notification. After all, when you have given your heart and soul to an organisation, it is never easy accepting the fact that you are being asked to leave at a moment’s notice. The situation becomes even more complicated when you have been with the company for more than a decade.

Something similar happened with Nicholas Whitaker, who had been working with the company since 2010 and found out about his layoff abruptly.

The 3 am email bringing bad news

“My layoff experience was traumatic. I got an email at 3 am to my personal email, that I only found because a colleague pinged me on Linkedin in the DMs to ask if I was ‘Ok’ and if I was ‘safe’,” Whitaker told Business Insider India in a conversation.

He added that when his colleague enquired about his safety, he thought it was a “shooting or some natural disaster.” In other words, he didn’t even imagine that he was being laid off from Google.

He then revealed that when he checked his work email, he discovered that he was locked out of his laptop and phone. He then checked his personal email and there it was, the “short and impersonal email” that told him that his role at Google was being eliminated.

The layoff process was uncomfortable

When Google announced large-scale layoffs last year, the company made a lot of headlines for handling them in an unprofessional manner. In March 2023, several Google employees had even written an open letter to Google CEO Sundar Pichai, asking him to deal with layoffs in a better manner.

Whitaker, narrating his own experience, shared with Business Insider India that after receiving the dreadful layoff email at 3 am, he spent the next few months completing formalities to get his payments that were due.

He said, “It took all of the next several months for me to mail back my laptop, badge and any gear that I had that was Google property. (I also had to) navigate unemployment, health insurance and get all of the documentation I had to submit to "self Offboard" and to receive payments that I was supposed to get.”

“Along the way there were multiple errors and miscommunications from the team that made it all even more uncomfortable,” he said.

Whitaker also noted a complete lack of communication and empathy from his old team at Google.

“I got a single text message from my prior manager asking how I was doing a few days after I was laid off, but otherwise no one reached out to check on me or offer assistance from my old team. Overall I found the process to be brutally impersonal and inhumane,” he said.

Experience at Google

But was Google always “inhumane” in his experience? Not really. There were some amazing days too and Google, according to Whitaker, was a different company when he had joined.

“My initial experience working at Google was like it was a completely different company. I started as a temp, contractor and then a vendor for Google back in 2010, and at the time I think it was something like 40,000 employees. It had a real startup feel to it. Teams were agile and collaborative, and there was a lot of room for growth. It may have been specific to my team and org, but it felt like you had a lot more room for experimentation and autonomy to make decisions, and failure wasn't seen as a bad thing, but a necessary part of innovation,” he said.

Whitaker also said that a “class system” was there at Google, especially since he was a TVC (Temporary, Vendor and Contractor).

“As a TVC you wouldn't be included in many of the activities and learning opportunities that full time employees had, and didn't get invited to extracurricular activities. There was a real bias towards culture at the time, and words like Don't be Evil, and be Googly were often used.”

However, in general, he added that the atmosphere was positive and full of possibilities. “Colleagues generally were very supportive, collaborative and encouraging to work with. I was excited as this was my first time working in big tech, or Corporate America and I saw that period of time as a real coming of age for me. I learned how to be a professional at Google and appreciated all of the early guidance and support that I got from colleagues and leaders.”

Helping others

It has now been over a year since Whitaker was laid off. He now has his own venture and helps other people navigate their careers.

Talking about what motivated him to kick-start his own venture, he said, “After 13 years in big tech, the last few years in particular being particularly difficult due to toxic teams and leaders, I didn't want to jump right back into that kind of experience again. A year before getting laid off, I had experienced a bad mental health crisis that was the result of workplace bullying, gaslighting and toxic leadership.

"I wanted to help others avoid and recover from similar situations and create a community where people can find mutual support and coaching on how to best navigate their careers in a conscious way. My severance after working so long at Google allowed me to fund the launch of my coaching business, and eventually ‘changingwork.org’."

Changing Work, Whitaker explained, is his way of addressing a deep need in corporate life — helping people rediscover their sense of purpose and alignment in their careers and finding ways to build more conscious leaders and businesses.

He added, “What makes this so transformative for me personally is that it allowed me to step into a role where I could integrate all the lessons from my own career—especially the parts that were hardest for me. During my time at Google, I saw firsthand how high-pressure environments can lead to burnout, anxiety, and a disconnect from our true selves.”

The recent tragic death of a young CA at Ernst & Young (EY) employee in India has turned the spotlight on toxic work cultures prevalent in many high-pressure industries. Broader debates on burnout, mental health struggles, and unrealistic expectations in corporate environments in the workplace have occupied social media platforms. This incident serves as a painful reminder that companies must prioritize employee well-being and mental health to foster sustainable, humane workplaces. And makes the work that people like Whitaker are doing all the more important.

“I’ve spoken publicly about how mindfulness practice, coaching and therapy literally saved my life during some of my darkest times at Google. Changing Work is the culmination of that journey. It’s not just about helping others find balance and fulfillment—it’s about creating a space where I can live those values every day,” he concludes.