In 2023, Google started a redundancy process that resulted in the departures of her boss and one of the senior managers who failed to report the sexual harassment, according to court documents.
In May that year, Woodall took her concerns about a boys’ club culture and the retaliation she was facing to the top of the organisation.
In her witness statement, she says she met with Debbie Weinstein, then vice president of Google UK and Ireland after hearing from a HR colleague that she was concerned about the team and the experiences of women.
Following their discussion, Weinstein, now president of Europe, Middle East and Africa, appeared shocked by Woodall’s claims. Court documents show she messaged a member of HR: “Just met Vicki [Woodall]. Holy moly. Want to get you for 10 mins today.”
Then in November 2023, as Google prepared for a broader reorganisation and redundancy process, Woodall claims there was a final push to remove her from the agency team.
That month, Weinstein messaged Dyana Najdi, Google’s managing director for UK and Ireland advertising, to say: “keep pushing…for solution on how you can run a process including agency [Woodall’s team]… gotta use this as a chance to exit people”, according to messages of their conversation submitted to court.
In March 2024, Woodall was made redundant alongside the second senior manager involved in the misconduct investigation, however she remains employed by the company receiving long-term sickness payments for work-related stress, according to her claim.
Google denies that Woodall was made redundant for whistleblowing, adding that her role was one of 26 across the team and wider department closed, according to its defence.
It disputes that Weinstein attempted to make Woodall redundant, saying she was very supportive towards her and instigated the investigation into the culture of the agency team.
The company accepts that Woodall’s report of the manager accused of misconduct was an act of whistleblowing, but denies any retaliation against her, saying the subsequent events were perfectly normal business decisions.