Like It or Not, There's No Avoiding Hot-Button Issues
Anymore
The rules that apply to 5-year-olds and swimming pools also
apply to founders and managers trying to sidestep dicey political and social
issues
BY HOWARD
TULLMAN, GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER, G2T3V AND CHICAGO HIGH TECH
INVESTORS@TULLMAN
Summer's here and it seems like the ideal time to remind both
our children and our CEOs of an immutable law of physics as well as a
long-standing tenet of swimming pool etiquette -- which is that you can't pee
in just part of the pool. For the kids, this simply makes good sense and a much
more pleasant experience for all. For the CEOs, especially as we roll into
another year when electoral politics will be front and center, it's more by way
of fair warning that the rules have changed. Sticking your head in the sand and
hoping that no one will notice your absence until the storm passes makes no
sense at all.
Any CEO who thinks he or she can still separate, isolate, and
insulate their business policies and practices from the sordid politics,
culture wars, and sewers of social media slander that have engulfed us and
drowned out any civil discourse is seriously deluded. The concept that you're
just going to pay attention to your business and not get involved with these
other issues is beyond naïve at this point. The noise, the concerns, the
exposures, and the risks are inescapable - just like pee in the pool - and
they're increasingly bound up with every part of your company as well. That
includes customers, employees, products, safety and environmental concerns and
yes, sad to say, social and political issues as well.
You're in the thick of it, like it or not, and you're going to
have to do something about it because the success of your company depends on
it. Even if your customers and clients aren't on your case about some of these
questions and controversies, you're not out of the woods. Because there are
many other parties to the conversation.
Just to be crystal clear, those angry, crazy barbarians outside
your walls aren't the only ones storming the gates. In fact, just as much
grief, angst and upset is likely to be coming from some of your own people
inside as well, and those numbers seem to be growing more rapidly every day.
Whether this is due to increased employee malaise, leading to more unionization
drives by unhappy MBAs now working as baristas, or the sheer pain of having to
deal with angry, over-stressed customers who haven't the slightest inclination
to be civil or understanding, the gloves are off.
At one point, it made a great deal of sense to propose that -
especially in terms of conversations and confrontations with customers - your
employees leave their own politics and issues at home, although in terms of matters like masking, it's not
always possible.
Unfortunately, post-pandemic, personal politics is still a big
issue, with loaded and volatile employee-to-employee conversations, so I
recently suggested that in terms of tamping down the internal turmoil,
the best plan might be to simply make it clear that certain tense topics and touchy subjects simply aren't
appropriate any longer for the office if they ever really were.
But honestly, I'm afraid that boat has sailed. If you don't step
up and step in, you can be sure that someone else will fill the vacuum and
carry on these conversations. And your efforts and actions will need to
differentiate between the varying nature of the discussions, which is mainly a
matter - like navels - of innies and outies. Let your belly button be your
guide.
Innies relate to a
company's rules, regulations, procedures and policies - including editorial
matters and content choices - which directly relate to the business and its
operations. Netflix's decision to continue to offer creative content acceptable
to some viewers and hateful to others is one such internal area. Netflix's bold
direction to employees is that the company will underwrite a wide variety of
content that is guaranteed to offend everyone at some point. Oh, and if you
don't like it, you can leave.
Office hours and remote or hybrid work are also internal
matters. Here again, at least in the case of Tesla, Elon Musk's position
couldn't be clearer: "Come back to the office 40 hours a week or go work
somewhere else." The bottom line is that these are direct concerns of your
company and your employees and, for better or worse, they are entitled to a
statement from management as to where things stand and ideally why certain
decisions are being made.
Outies, on the other hand, are
issues - especially cultural and political concerns - that have to do with the
outside world. Don't fool yourself: these matters will eventually and directly
impact your own life, family, and livelihood and those of your people as well.
Notwithstanding that inevitable prospect, I still advise that the better,
smarter course is discretion. Your team (and maybe your customers) is still
entitled to an explanation, but it's perfectly appropriate to ignore the
bullying and BS of a vocal and woke minority and simply take the position that
the company isn't going to take a position.
If you need any obvious evidence of the difficulty and danger of
stepping outside of your comfort zone and trying to straddle your way into any
of these cultural wars, Disney's continuing problems are a clear case in point.
There were plenty of Disney customers and cast members on both sides of the gay
rights issue and Disney's first instinct was to try to stay out of the fray.
When the CEO was quite quickly shamed into changing his mind, everything went
sideways. Sadly, it's pretty clear that disgraced former president Donald Trump
and shameless Florida Governor Ron DeSantis - aided and abetted by their thugs
- will continue to harass corporate targets such as Disney in order to keep
scamming money from MAGA suckers.
The situation only gets worse when the lines between inside and
out get further blurred. Amazon had a similar issue arise when some employees
objected to the company selling books that they deemed to be negative towards
trans people. When external concerns get pulled into the business environment
and interfere with operations, attitudes, and interpersonal relationships at
work, it becomes an unending can of worms where no one, even with the best of
intentions, can ever win.