As someone who lives outside America, the obvious answer to me is unless your product is directly related to politics, a company as an entity should have no public stance on politics.
From the outside looking in, American politics has long since ceased being about policy and idea's, it is now a contest of identity where it doesn't matter what someone stands for so long as they are on the team I support.
In this kind of climate, for a business or other entity to involve themselves in politics would be consciously choosing to more or less blacklist themselves from doing business with the other side or run the risk of having their brand tarnished via social media for whatever stance they take.
Finally, a business that takes a political stance does damage not just to themselves but to their employees as in the current political climate, both sides have no problems harassing a person or worse if they are viewed as not "on their team". Once a company takes a political stance, it doesn't matter if what that employee believes or does nor does it matter that said employee might be working for this company because they have a family to feed and don't have the luxury of quitting and looking for a new job, the very fact that they work for said company means that they should be treated as persona-non-grata.
Make it simple, a company can't vote, so a company doesn't have a political affiliation (unless of course, it is some kind of lobbying company etc).
One of my favorite moments of 2020 was when coinbase stood up against the madness of people using the company as a vehicle to promote their irrelevant politics. Politics has its place but just gets in the way of doing work in the workplace. The only politics that should be promoted in the workplace is the politics that helps the company accomplish its specific goals. I predict that market forces will cause more startups to follow suit.
One of the things that made me quit my last job was the director frequently talking politics before meetings while waiting for everyone to join.
There's no winning. Agree and risk setting yourself at odds against your peers and future managers, or disagree and put yourself at odds with the person who holds the purse for your team.
Even worse, complain to HR, and risk politically disagreeing with them.
I stuck with that job long enough to find something better, and almost regret staying with it as long as I did.
The other reason I totally agree with this is because there is always the unwritten rule that what a company can support politically is pretty much always in service to its bottom line. I mean, just look at Google, whose employees are known for being especially politically active. Except, that is, when it comes to the negative societal effect of large monopolies (there was a recent HN discussion about this). People at Google know what pays their (very large) salaries.
What’s interesting about that case is that >5% of employees quit.
So these were people that coinbase decided, out of all available applicants—and as a well-known, hugely profitable company that is the only “in any way mainstream” success story of cryptocurrency-based businesses, there are a fair number of them—thought were the right fit. (That’s excluding the people who were given offers and didn’t accept, of course.)
And then greater than one in twenty employees (that’s a lot) heard what he said and were like, nope, this is not someone I want to follow.
Is that a success? Maybe! I can’t think of a time when we’ve seen that level of voluntary departure from a company and thought, “ah yes, this is good.” Or when we’ve seen something like that and thought, “ah yes, this is what leadership looks like.”
Maybe he’s right! I don’t know. We’ll see.
But when I look at America, with its staggering income inequality and tremendous corporate cash investments into political elections, I don’t personally think, “wow there sure is too much social accountability at companies.”
You know?
I don’t look at Facebook and think, “they should really just focus on being a data mining advertising business. This thing about fomenting extremism is distracting us from them as a corporate enterprise in a capitalist system.”
The kicker here is that actual politics is prohibited by law. Companies can't be endorsing candidates or providing in-kind contributions without getting into trouble with the FEC.
So this is all about performative poses in the workplace, on the topic of politics, rather than being about actual politics.
If the workplace did not have its own issues I would agree. But, since, to take one example, sexism is a known problem in tech - and throughout corporate America and society, to be fair - in order to not have a sexist workplace, one would need to be proactive.
Broadly speaking. Point being, it's easy to not want "politics" in the workplace when the workplace works well for you. If you're someone whom the workplace doesn't work well for, like a person of color, a pregnant woman, new mother, or new father, for that matter, well, then it's a different story.
If you yourself believe that sexism/systemic racism aren't issues that show up (even inadvertently or despite the best intentions of individuals) in the workplace, well, then that's a different conversation entirely.
I think this is different from someone in a position of power promoting a particular candidate in the workplace. That is more complex and problematic. The 2020 election was obviously an extreme example, and, tbh, with things like global warming, I think we'll be seeing more politics like that in the workplace, not less.
Which, to me, means it's not an easy or one-size-fits all solution, but rather, a challenge which requires each of us to exercise care and our own judgement.
For example, personally, I would have liked to see Hacker News take even a small explicit step of endorsing the Black Lives Matter movement (such as putting 'Black lives matter' on the top of the homepage), seeing as how it's one of the major civil rights issues of our present moment. I can also understand their concerns around doing so, even though I disagree with them.
IMHO it's too easy for those of us doing well and making money to forget that the institutions we work for have a social impact and are a part of society.
I another problem is this can also lead to not being involved in the local community.
In San Francisco, the collective "tech industry" has long been demonized for various things. IMO, some fair, some not. "Google Buses" taking space at MUNI stops was one for quite a while. Contributing to increasing housing costs is a long time favorite.
But a lot of these come from a culture where you build your company on top of the infrastructure provided by the local community and government. Then build a very successful business on top of that, but have minimal engagement with the local government and community. So you create a perception that you're just taking, and not actually part of the local community.
It seems to me that the Coinbase case just doubles down on this attitude.
In contrast, Salesforce has the largest building in San Francisco named after them, and a huge urban park. I don't see them getting dragged into the anti-tech sentiment. Because I think they've effectively engaged with the local community and given back a lot.
They have a culture of volunteer work, strongly encouraging employees to take time off to volunteer for local causes. They also donate to many local causes. Marc Benioff is certainly involved in politics, and advocating for specific ideas and policies. But because him and his company engage in various ways, and make substantial philanthropic contributions, they are usually respected for it.
> It seems to me that the Coinbase case just doubles down on this attitude.
It isn't just that attitude that's the problem, it's the insistence by Coinbase that they're apolitical, yet the company makes significant political contributions themselves[1].
Salesforce doesn't get dragged into anti-tech sentiment because they build a b2b product. The Twitter activists who lead most of the anti-tech crusades don't know what CRM is or what it does because they
never interact with it because they are unemployed.
The people who do use Salesforce for the most part hate it. But you'll never see widespread outrage about Salesforce because the people who use it have jobs, families, and friends that prevent them from spending all day on social media.
I doubt that anti-tech people really discern different companies. Most likely Salesforce is not consumer oriented and therefore not really a name that springs to mind when it comes to tech.
To be frank from a North Eastern admittedly suburban perspective the "local community" manages to seem to be in the wrong here and sound very entitled. Reaching out for philanthropy is well and good and a positive thing, but the hostility and demands runs afoul of "minding your own business" essentially. It is one thing if they were say polluting or being an attractor of crime would be fair enough but complaining about high paying jobs seems downright spoiled and unpleasable. Essentially if the local government can't handle the issues with an increased tax flood the problem isn't the goose that lays the golden eggs.
I grew up in SF, and I'm a tech weanie, and I gotta say: We have been terrible neighbors. We have been like the guy that bought a condo in North Beach and then sued the church for ringing their bells, but 10,000x worse. We've kind of ruined the city.
As for Marc Benioff, he's the only billionaire who seems to actually, visibly give a shit. He's Jimmy James. (Even if that fwcking tower looks alternately like a phallus or a giant middle finger. Whatever, dude's cool.)
I don't see how Salesforce Park avoids getting demonized. It's a nice park, but it's literally above it all, set up in a way so that homeless people can't really do much.
In San Francisco, aren't people going to object to this, eventually? Symbolism seems to be what people care about, and the symbolism of being above it all seems unavoidable.
Companies are collections of people, each of which are free to have their own beliefs, but that doesn't mean the company should officially share and support their individual beliefs. I see this only causing endless division within the company, instead of people being (more) unified in their pursuit of the company's vision.
Why not encourage employees to represent their beliefs individually, and off company time, by giving them more vacation and flexible working hours instead? Empower the employees to participate in politics without the company taking a side itself?
I'm tired of people pushing their political beliefs onto me at every opportunity, in every available setting, IRL and online.
The reason why politics used to be separated from business is that political processes must follow certain rules:
* If you wish to run a political campaign, you need to be very transparent about your sources of funding.
* If you wish to make certain idea into a law (that would force others to follow it), it must be approved by several layers of elected representatives, before it becomes mandatory.
* If someone believes that someone else does not comply with the law, they bring it to the court. Where the independent judiciary branch uses the due process to independently evaluate the situation and decide who wins the case.
These safeguards are put in place to counter abuse. They make sure that the laws (and their interpretation) serves the best interests of the general population.
Modern workplace politics completely bypasses these principles. If your activism fits a few select topics, you get to conduct it on your company's expense. You get to force people to follow the rules you set without any semblance of voting. You get to punish people you don't like without any due process. You can respond to any criticism of yourself with an accusation of one of the new deadly sins, and this immediately destroys your opponent politically and financially.
This is a somewhat tough problem for companies at this point in time. To executives focused on customers, sales, product - this is an even more interesting issue because it has really nothing to do directly with the company itself.
Most customer segmentation problems can be solved with an optional feature or a new product line - make both chunky marinara sauce and a smooth variety.
Most employee problems can be solved similarly - optional programs, different roles for different folks, etc.
But this problem is unique because a certain segment of the employee+customer base is asking the complete company to take their side in certain matters. Of course the company taking that stand alienates the other segment of the population.
However, rationally, it becomes much easier to deal with this than what Coinbase did.
It seems though that the vocal side (liberal) is vocal because they care about companies stances on these matters, while the silent (conservatives) are silent because they don't seem to care as much.
Therefore, rationally, companies generally take the liberal position or no position at all.
When conservatives listen to politically-left company seminars, see liberal company statements, etc - they mostly just ignore and move on with their day. I don't think many conservatives would be motivated to quit or boycott a company due to a liberal company seminar that they disagree with. I get the feeling (due to the walkouts, etc) that liberals are much more likely to sever relationships due to differences in political beliefs.
"conservatives are silent because they don't seem to care as much."
It's certainly the case that they don't seem to care as much, given that they're less outspoken, but is there any evidence that they actually don't care as much?
Another explanation for being less outspoken is that they're a small minority in these companies, so they lack the confidence to go against the grain, perhaps out of fear (whether valid or not) of alienation. Or conversely liberals are more confident to voice their opinion because they know they're in the majority opinion group and doing so isn't likely to stymie their career or cause stressful backlash.
Paul Graham tweeted out some survey evidence yesterday that supports the idea that conservatives are simply more afraid to speak their mind in these companies.
Also, like most exercises of power, one has to have power in order to exercise it. Conservatives are usually more worried about not being fired for their views.
There's an interesting asymmetry between the liberal and conservative sides that isn't captured just by left/right: the liberals generally have some active change they want to make, and the conservatives don't - they just want to "conserve" what's currently being done. That means that if a company just takes the default position on things, it's already siding with the conservatives. So it's unsurprising, in that sense, that the liberals are more vocal: there's no real point in a conservative organizing a protest for "We should not extend our anti-discrimination provisions beyond what is legally required" or "We should be willing to sell to all customers that we can legally sell to" or whatever.
One example of that latter bit: Google rank-and-file protested against the executives' plan to run censored search in China, even though if you listen to the media, Google is "left" and it's the "right" who's worried about China and their authoritarianism and censorship and all that. The more elucidating explanation is that the disagreement was between the people who wanted to make money wherever legally permitted vs. the people who felt a sense of broader social responsibility regarding what they worked on, which is why you see the same fault lines (rank-and-file vs. execs) protesting against Google selling cloud services to ICE, even though that's a concern of the "left."
More generally, about which side finds itself being vocal, I recently ran across this passage from a Wikipedia article about a video game released in 2013:
> Following the announcement of a worldwide release, controversy arose concerning the impossibility of same-sex relationships. Nintendo stated, "The ability for same-sex relationships to occur in the game was not part of the original game that launched in Japan, and that game is made up of the same code that was used to localise it for other regions outside Japan." [...] Despite various campaigns from users, Nintendo stated that it would not be possible to add same-sex relationships to the game, as they "never intended to make any form of social commentary with the launch of the game", and because it would require significant development alterations which would not be able to be released as a post-game patch.
This game (Tomodachi Life) is in the same approximate genre as The Sims, i.e., the complaint wasn't about pre-programed characters with stories, it was that user-generated characters couldn't be in same-sex relationships. If a game like that launched today - in Japan or anywhere else - it would certainly not manage to avoid "any form of social commentary" by not having an option for same-sex relationships. It's just that at the time, that genuinely was the default, conservative option. If you were a conservative in Nintendo at the time, you hardly had to argue for this position. It only became controversial because public opinion had just started to shift. (And there are much fewer conservatives / right-leaning folks today who would feel the need to argue the same position against the new status quo.)
So I don't think it's true that companies "take the liberal position or no position at all." They start out taking the conservative position, and it's only through specific action - either the desire of management, or pressure from either the product's market or the labor market - that they end up with the liberal one.
> When conservatives listen to politically-left company seminars, see liberal company statements, etc - they mostly just ignore and move on with their day.
Trump signed an executive order banning the government from doing business with vendors that do racial sensitivity training.
>while the silent (conservatives) are silent because they don't seem to care as much.
Most of the conservatives I know are silent because they are busy. Busy raising and teaching their kids. Busy taking care of their property. Busy making their own life better. It doesn't mean that they don't care. They just believe that each person should be first and foremost responsible for their own well-being. If someone asks for help with a specific quantifiable problem, they will gladly help.
Most vocal liberals, on the contrary, are priced out of having a large enough property to take care of, or a large family that takes a lot of energy. Because they have extra time and energy, they tend to spend it on the causes that the media presents to them as important. Note that their salary expectations will be lower, compared to conservatives, since family, property and retirement plans are one's biggest expenses. I would dare say many of them feel jealous towards the conservatives and believe they got an unfair advantage.
In short-term, it's beneficial for companies to support political activism, because it keeps the employees busy with projects that don't increase their monetary demands. In long term, this ends up with tribalism, where people spend most of their energy attacking their peers over growing number of differences.
It is nonsensical to write the title as such, all tech startups (since we're talking about them, but not only) do politics. They just choose it to do it in different directions. Most often when someone says they don't want to involve themselves with politics they are alright with the status-quo, which is a political position in itself. Politics is not just about a vote at a presidential election, it's the how and why of everything you do and will do, be it in the tech startup or elsewhere.
Everything else is fair game, even if it typically falls under a party.
For example: Gay stuff - it's typically democratic/liberal - although many would argue it's being supported more and more by the right. But one should be able to discuss and support gay agendas - as long as there's no specific party endorsement. Stick to specifics like bathrooms (for example) but don't mention "democrats support this too" or whatever.
Another example would be to around climate change. It's okay to discuss ways to reduce pollution, just don't endorse candidate or party X as the way that's going to happen.
So stop mentioning parties or candidates and shit - just issues.
This is a really binary view of politics and to me represents why we shouldn’t talk politics at work. People’s views on issues aren’t binary and people on the same side of the left right political divide can disagree on issues. How many leftists disagrees with Expensify’s promotion of Joe Biden? How many black people may not want to get into the nuances of Joe Biden’s support of the 1994 crime bill, even if they end up supporting him? Does a woman who just went through a difficult abortion want to be around people passionately supporting abortion rights?
The problem with discussing politics at work is that we are not all 100% free to be there. We depend on being at work and potentially being offended by people who we have to continue to work with for our livelihoods.
That being said it’s incredibly nuanced. People should be able to be unabashedly out at work. People should be able to talk about why they support having birth control as part of their health plan. Vulnerable and targeted populations should be able to talk about the struggle and discrimination they experience.
IBM recently apologized to one of its former computer scientists Lynn Conway whom it fired 50 years ago for being trans. When she was fired, she was a nobody and IBM felt that her transition would attract scandalous publicity. Now she's an accomplished award-winning professor. Is IBM playing politics? Was Conway playing politics when she decided to transition?
Did I miss it, or did this article specifically leave out the paid leave packages Coinbase put together for the employees who wouldn't want to stay after his post?
You didn’t miss it. If you’re aware that these packages exist, the wording is extremely misleading. Hard to imagine someone reading the article with no prior context and guessing that employees who left received 3 months (IIRC) of severance. This type of of misleading framing is not uncommon at the NYT.
The answer to the question is no. Companies should not do politics.
Companies, however, will continue to do politics so long as it furthers their self-interest as there is a failure of separation of powers between government and corporations in the modern age.
Everyone is so focused on making money that they're missing the foundations of that money-making collapsing underneath them. When the society no longer operates on rule-of-law, and people are impoverished, there is no market anymore.
They're not talking about whether companies should give money to politicians' campaigns, in hopes that the politician will then support their interests?
Those who think companies should under no circumstances "do politics", are you bothered by that too? That's the most popular form of "doing politics" across the entire economy I think, and it probably has an affect on legislation and policy that effects us all.
Basically, companies have an obligation to 'do the right thing' when it comes to universal human rights, but not beyond. The only exception is when it comes to their own industry where the companies have an obligation to share knowledge with the public / regulators.
I'd like to note that, if companies don't want politics, then maybe they should have less power in our system...! Activists only care because companies have a HUGE impact on government policy compared to normal citizens.
I would pay a premium for employees who can work with people whose opinions they strongly disagree with. If you're one these people please try to signal it somehow during the interview process.
The danger in all this is that today's popular moral action is tomorrow's reprehensible mistake.
Ask John Cleese. Or Harvey Weinstein. Or any one of a thousand people who became drunk on the nectar of pop approval, only to find they didn't go far enough, or chose a decision that didn't align with the way things turned out.
I don't care what your politics are, nobody is going to take a position on controversial issues and be 100 percent correct. You're going to alienate a lot of people today, and significantly alient some more later.
Harvey Weinstein's alleged reprehensible mistake was allegedly sexually assaulting people. I don't think you're saying that was at one time a popular moral action, so I'm not sure what you mean about Weinstein learning that one day's popular moral action is the next's reprehensible mistake. Is there some position on controversial issues he took that I'm not thinking of, that at one point was popular but no longer is? Or what do you mean about Weinstein making a mistake by taking a controversial political stand?
Technically, I agree, but there is a sizable range of opinions where reasonable folks can agree to disagree, and produce good work. The set of people holding opinions in that range is larger than some of the commenters in this thread seem to believe.
[+] [-] shruubi|5 years ago|reply
From the outside looking in, American politics has long since ceased being about policy and idea's, it is now a contest of identity where it doesn't matter what someone stands for so long as they are on the team I support.
In this kind of climate, for a business or other entity to involve themselves in politics would be consciously choosing to more or less blacklist themselves from doing business with the other side or run the risk of having their brand tarnished via social media for whatever stance they take.
Finally, a business that takes a political stance does damage not just to themselves but to their employees as in the current political climate, both sides have no problems harassing a person or worse if they are viewed as not "on their team". Once a company takes a political stance, it doesn't matter if what that employee believes or does nor does it matter that said employee might be working for this company because they have a family to feed and don't have the luxury of quitting and looking for a new job, the very fact that they work for said company means that they should be treated as persona-non-grata.
Make it simple, a company can't vote, so a company doesn't have a political affiliation (unless of course, it is some kind of lobbying company etc).
[+] [-] CyberRabbi|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zdragnar|5 years ago|reply
There's no winning. Agree and risk setting yourself at odds against your peers and future managers, or disagree and put yourself at odds with the person who holds the purse for your team.
Even worse, complain to HR, and risk politically disagreeing with them.
I stuck with that job long enough to find something better, and almost regret staying with it as long as I did.
[+] [-] hn_throwaway_99|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] baby|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tyre|5 years ago|reply
So these were people that coinbase decided, out of all available applicants—and as a well-known, hugely profitable company that is the only “in any way mainstream” success story of cryptocurrency-based businesses, there are a fair number of them—thought were the right fit. (That’s excluding the people who were given offers and didn’t accept, of course.)
And then greater than one in twenty employees (that’s a lot) heard what he said and were like, nope, this is not someone I want to follow.
Is that a success? Maybe! I can’t think of a time when we’ve seen that level of voluntary departure from a company and thought, “ah yes, this is good.” Or when we’ve seen something like that and thought, “ah yes, this is what leadership looks like.”
Maybe he’s right! I don’t know. We’ll see.
But when I look at America, with its staggering income inequality and tremendous corporate cash investments into political elections, I don’t personally think, “wow there sure is too much social accountability at companies.”
You know?
I don’t look at Facebook and think, “they should really just focus on being a data mining advertising business. This thing about fomenting extremism is distracting us from them as a corporate enterprise in a capitalist system.”
Yikes.
[+] [-] free_rms|5 years ago|reply
So this is all about performative poses in the workplace, on the topic of politics, rather than being about actual politics.
[+] [-] adamsea|5 years ago|reply
Broadly speaking. Point being, it's easy to not want "politics" in the workplace when the workplace works well for you. If you're someone whom the workplace doesn't work well for, like a person of color, a pregnant woman, new mother, or new father, for that matter, well, then it's a different story.
If you yourself believe that sexism/systemic racism aren't issues that show up (even inadvertently or despite the best intentions of individuals) in the workplace, well, then that's a different conversation entirely.
I think this is different from someone in a position of power promoting a particular candidate in the workplace. That is more complex and problematic. The 2020 election was obviously an extreme example, and, tbh, with things like global warming, I think we'll be seeing more politics like that in the workplace, not less.
Which, to me, means it's not an easy or one-size-fits all solution, but rather, a challenge which requires each of us to exercise care and our own judgement.
For example, personally, I would have liked to see Hacker News take even a small explicit step of endorsing the Black Lives Matter movement (such as putting 'Black lives matter' on the top of the homepage), seeing as how it's one of the major civil rights issues of our present moment. I can also understand their concerns around doing so, even though I disagree with them.
IMHO it's too easy for those of us doing well and making money to forget that the institutions we work for have a social impact and are a part of society.
[+] [-] kelp|5 years ago|reply
In San Francisco, the collective "tech industry" has long been demonized for various things. IMO, some fair, some not. "Google Buses" taking space at MUNI stops was one for quite a while. Contributing to increasing housing costs is a long time favorite.
But a lot of these come from a culture where you build your company on top of the infrastructure provided by the local community and government. Then build a very successful business on top of that, but have minimal engagement with the local government and community. So you create a perception that you're just taking, and not actually part of the local community.
It seems to me that the Coinbase case just doubles down on this attitude.
In contrast, Salesforce has the largest building in San Francisco named after them, and a huge urban park. I don't see them getting dragged into the anti-tech sentiment. Because I think they've effectively engaged with the local community and given back a lot.
They have a culture of volunteer work, strongly encouraging employees to take time off to volunteer for local causes. They also donate to many local causes. Marc Benioff is certainly involved in politics, and advocating for specific ideas and policies. But because him and his company engage in various ways, and make substantial philanthropic contributions, they are usually respected for it.
[+] [-] heavyset_go|5 years ago|reply
It isn't just that attitude that's the problem, it's the insistence by Coinbase that they're apolitical, yet the company makes significant political contributions themselves[1].
[1] https://www.fec.gov/data/receipts/individual-contributions/?...
[+] [-] splaytreemap|5 years ago|reply
The people who do use Salesforce for the most part hate it. But you'll never see widespread outrage about Salesforce because the people who use it have jobs, families, and friends that prevent them from spending all day on social media.
[+] [-] flyinglizard|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Nasrudith|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|5 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] carapace|5 years ago|reply
As for Marc Benioff, he's the only billionaire who seems to actually, visibly give a shit. He's Jimmy James. (Even if that fwcking tower looks alternately like a phallus or a giant middle finger. Whatever, dude's cool.)
[+] [-] skybrian|5 years ago|reply
In San Francisco, aren't people going to object to this, eventually? Symbolism seems to be what people care about, and the symbolism of being above it all seems unavoidable.
[+] [-] errantmind|5 years ago|reply
Why not encourage employees to represent their beliefs individually, and off company time, by giving them more vacation and flexible working hours instead? Empower the employees to participate in politics without the company taking a side itself?
I'm tired of people pushing their political beliefs onto me at every opportunity, in every available setting, IRL and online.
[+] [-] john_moscow|5 years ago|reply
* If you wish to run a political campaign, you need to be very transparent about your sources of funding.
* If you wish to make certain idea into a law (that would force others to follow it), it must be approved by several layers of elected representatives, before it becomes mandatory.
* If someone believes that someone else does not comply with the law, they bring it to the court. Where the independent judiciary branch uses the due process to independently evaluate the situation and decide who wins the case.
These safeguards are put in place to counter abuse. They make sure that the laws (and their interpretation) serves the best interests of the general population.
Modern workplace politics completely bypasses these principles. If your activism fits a few select topics, you get to conduct it on your company's expense. You get to force people to follow the rules you set without any semblance of voting. You get to punish people you don't like without any due process. You can respond to any criticism of yourself with an accusation of one of the new deadly sins, and this immediately destroys your opponent politically and financially.
[+] [-] tuna-piano|5 years ago|reply
Most customer segmentation problems can be solved with an optional feature or a new product line - make both chunky marinara sauce and a smooth variety.
Most employee problems can be solved similarly - optional programs, different roles for different folks, etc.
But this problem is unique because a certain segment of the employee+customer base is asking the complete company to take their side in certain matters. Of course the company taking that stand alienates the other segment of the population.
However, rationally, it becomes much easier to deal with this than what Coinbase did.
It seems though that the vocal side (liberal) is vocal because they care about companies stances on these matters, while the silent (conservatives) are silent because they don't seem to care as much.
Therefore, rationally, companies generally take the liberal position or no position at all.
When conservatives listen to politically-left company seminars, see liberal company statements, etc - they mostly just ignore and move on with their day. I don't think many conservatives would be motivated to quit or boycott a company due to a liberal company seminar that they disagree with. I get the feeling (due to the walkouts, etc) that liberals are much more likely to sever relationships due to differences in political beliefs.
[+] [-] hnracer|5 years ago|reply
It's certainly the case that they don't seem to care as much, given that they're less outspoken, but is there any evidence that they actually don't care as much?
Another explanation for being less outspoken is that they're a small minority in these companies, so they lack the confidence to go against the grain, perhaps out of fear (whether valid or not) of alienation. Or conversely liberals are more confident to voice their opinion because they know they're in the majority opinion group and doing so isn't likely to stymie their career or cause stressful backlash.
Paul Graham tweeted out some survey evidence yesterday that supports the idea that conservatives are simply more afraid to speak their mind in these companies.
[+] [-] philwelch|5 years ago|reply
Also, like most exercises of power, one has to have power in order to exercise it. Conservatives are usually more worried about not being fired for their views.
[+] [-] geofft|5 years ago|reply
One example of that latter bit: Google rank-and-file protested against the executives' plan to run censored search in China, even though if you listen to the media, Google is "left" and it's the "right" who's worried about China and their authoritarianism and censorship and all that. The more elucidating explanation is that the disagreement was between the people who wanted to make money wherever legally permitted vs. the people who felt a sense of broader social responsibility regarding what they worked on, which is why you see the same fault lines (rank-and-file vs. execs) protesting against Google selling cloud services to ICE, even though that's a concern of the "left."
More generally, about which side finds itself being vocal, I recently ran across this passage from a Wikipedia article about a video game released in 2013:
> Following the announcement of a worldwide release, controversy arose concerning the impossibility of same-sex relationships. Nintendo stated, "The ability for same-sex relationships to occur in the game was not part of the original game that launched in Japan, and that game is made up of the same code that was used to localise it for other regions outside Japan." [...] Despite various campaigns from users, Nintendo stated that it would not be possible to add same-sex relationships to the game, as they "never intended to make any form of social commentary with the launch of the game", and because it would require significant development alterations which would not be able to be released as a post-game patch.
This game (Tomodachi Life) is in the same approximate genre as The Sims, i.e., the complaint wasn't about pre-programed characters with stories, it was that user-generated characters couldn't be in same-sex relationships. If a game like that launched today - in Japan or anywhere else - it would certainly not manage to avoid "any form of social commentary" by not having an option for same-sex relationships. It's just that at the time, that genuinely was the default, conservative option. If you were a conservative in Nintendo at the time, you hardly had to argue for this position. It only became controversial because public opinion had just started to shift. (And there are much fewer conservatives / right-leaning folks today who would feel the need to argue the same position against the new status quo.)
So I don't think it's true that companies "take the liberal position or no position at all." They start out taking the conservative position, and it's only through specific action - either the desire of management, or pressure from either the product's market or the labor market - that they end up with the liberal one.
[+] [-] evan_|5 years ago|reply
Trump signed an executive order banning the government from doing business with vendors that do racial sensitivity training.
https://www.npr.org/2020/09/22/915843471/trump-expands-ban-o...
[+] [-] theplague42|5 years ago|reply
Not to mention the months-long propaganda campaign claiming that Big Tech was silencing conservatives on social media.
Also, conservatism is basically supporting the status quo. Why would conservatives have labor protests against the status quo?
[+] [-] john_moscow|5 years ago|reply
Most of the conservatives I know are silent because they are busy. Busy raising and teaching their kids. Busy taking care of their property. Busy making their own life better. It doesn't mean that they don't care. They just believe that each person should be first and foremost responsible for their own well-being. If someone asks for help with a specific quantifiable problem, they will gladly help.
Most vocal liberals, on the contrary, are priced out of having a large enough property to take care of, or a large family that takes a lot of energy. Because they have extra time and energy, they tend to spend it on the causes that the media presents to them as important. Note that their salary expectations will be lower, compared to conservatives, since family, property and retirement plans are one's biggest expenses. I would dare say many of them feel jealous towards the conservatives and believe they got an unfair advantage.
In short-term, it's beneficial for companies to support political activism, because it keeps the employees busy with projects that don't increase their monetary demands. In long term, this ends up with tribalism, where people spend most of their energy attacking their peers over growing number of differences.
[+] [-] neves|5 years ago|reply
Not taking a political stand IS political stand. And it is on the side of the status quo.
[+] [-] lle-bout|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] coding123|5 years ago|reply
Everything else is fair game, even if it typically falls under a party.
For example: Gay stuff - it's typically democratic/liberal - although many would argue it's being supported more and more by the right. But one should be able to discuss and support gay agendas - as long as there's no specific party endorsement. Stick to specifics like bathrooms (for example) but don't mention "democrats support this too" or whatever.
Another example would be to around climate change. It's okay to discuss ways to reduce pollution, just don't endorse candidate or party X as the way that's going to happen.
So stop mentioning parties or candidates and shit - just issues.
[+] [-] readams|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mikkergp|5 years ago|reply
The problem with discussing politics at work is that we are not all 100% free to be there. We depend on being at work and potentially being offended by people who we have to continue to work with for our livelihoods.
That being said it’s incredibly nuanced. People should be able to be unabashedly out at work. People should be able to talk about why they support having birth control as part of their health plan. Vulnerable and targeted populations should be able to talk about the struggle and discrimination they experience.
[+] [-] KKKKkkkk1|5 years ago|reply
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/21/business/lynn-conway-ibm-...
[+] [-] pochamago|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wskinner|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] awak3ning|5 years ago|reply
Companies, however, will continue to do politics so long as it furthers their self-interest as there is a failure of separation of powers between government and corporations in the modern age.
[+] [-] satya71|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jrochkind1|5 years ago|reply
Those who think companies should under no circumstances "do politics", are you bothered by that too? That's the most popular form of "doing politics" across the entire economy I think, and it probably has an affect on legislation and policy that effects us all.
[+] [-] schimmy_changa|5 years ago|reply
Basically, companies have an obligation to 'do the right thing' when it comes to universal human rights, but not beyond. The only exception is when it comes to their own industry where the companies have an obligation to share knowledge with the public / regulators.
I'd like to note that, if companies don't want politics, then maybe they should have less power in our system...! Activists only care because companies have a HUGE impact on government policy compared to normal citizens.
[+] [-] gotoeleven|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] octoberfranklin|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|5 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] eat_veggies|5 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] zabhi|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] LatteLazy|5 years ago|reply
https://web.archive.org/web/20201122160535/https://www.nytim...
[+] [-] baybal2|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] RickJWagner|5 years ago|reply
Ask John Cleese. Or Harvey Weinstein. Or any one of a thousand people who became drunk on the nectar of pop approval, only to find they didn't go far enough, or chose a decision that didn't align with the way things turned out.
I don't care what your politics are, nobody is going to take a position on controversial issues and be 100 percent correct. You're going to alienate a lot of people today, and significantly alient some more later.
It's smarter to avoid it.
[+] [-] jrochkind1|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] newbie789|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bitmunk|5 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] judge2020|5 years ago|reply