Google's CEO Sends the Perfect Message
Sundar Pichai made it
very clear to employees that they are free to express their opinions--but the
workplace isn't going to serve as their forum. Business owners would be wise to
follow his example.
EXPERT OPINION BY HOWARD
TULLMAN, GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER, G2T3V AND CHICAGO HIGH TECH
INVESTORS @HOWARDTULLMAN1
APR 30, 2024
Thank goodness for
Google and particularly for Sundar Pichai, its straightforward, honest, and
gutsy CEO. He stepped up bigtime to put a stake in the ground and let his
arrogant and over-entitled employees know their place and what's what.
Google's computers can
do many things, but they can't stand on principle. That requires a real leader.
For a modest, soft-spoken and thoughtful guy, he's emerged as a shining and
forceful example of how to succinctly handle the current crisis in our companies
and our colleges concerning disruptive student and employee protests that know
no reasonable bounds. These people are perfectly happy to attack and suppress
other people's speech in the name of whatever cause they're pushing today.
But they don't seem to understand that it's much easier to
"fight" for some abstract principles than it is to live up to them
each day, which they aren't doing.
Their performative and
destructive gestures are expressly and aggressively designed not simply to
express an opinion, but to interrupt, harass and interfere with the daily
lives, business, travel, and education of thousands of other students and
faculty, employees and customers, and commuters and civilians across the
country. People who are simply hoping to be left alone in their companies,
schools, airports, highways, and communities. We've been warned in the past
that the crap being fed to the current generation of college students by
clueless professors and feckless administrators would soon spread to our
companies and that we needed to be prepared for the onslaught. We
should have paid more attention.
We're in a moment marked
by duplicity, weasel words, and abject hypocrisy among far too many corporate
and government leaders. Especially in the words and inactions of two-faced,
DEI-saturated university presidents of elite institutions like Columbia, Harvard,
or MIT. They keep trying to split hairs, divine and define non-existent
contexts, and generally pray that they'll somehow keep their jobs if they can
only keep the peace on their campuses for a little while longer.
Pichai, on the other
hand, spoke up. Clearly, concisely, dispassionately and with admirable
conviction, he set a high bar for the rest of us, but not one that is unduly
complicated. He described Google as a "workplace" and a business with
clear policies and behavioral expectations. Most importantly he said that
it was "not a place to act in a way that disrupts coworkers or makes them
feel unsafe, to attempt to use the company as a personal platform, or to fight
over disruptive issues or debate politics."
I've previously said
much the same thing about not bringing the bullshit into the business. The
badly misunderstood idea that the 1st Amendment entitles idiots
to express themselves in private homes, businesses or religious institutions
cannot be further extended and inflated to mean that companies must permit
these morons to use and abuse corporate forums for their own purposes. Senior
management, not the HR department or the DEI dullards, needs to step in. You
can stand for certain things without having to stand for everything that anyone
cares to act out and demonstrate on your premises, and in your name. If you
don't draw the red lines early, clearly, and often as to what's appropriate
within your business -- whatever kind of business it is -- then there's no end
to the problems you're inviting. And, subsequently, no end to the damage that could be caused to your organization, to
the morale of your people, and to your own reputation.
This whole area is one
very slippery slope. As you might expect, no good deed goes unpunished because
no one is pure enough for these unhappy and puritanical polemicists. I have
tried and suggested that reasonable people (and that may have been my first mistake)
could come to appreciate and understand that there are some matters that are
appropriate for conversation and discussion in the office; others simply
aren't. But it's far too easy for the lines between inside and out to get bent
and blurred. Amazon had a similar issue when some employees objected to the
company selling books 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 ever-bigger can of worms, where
no one, even with the best of intentions, can ever win.
Another approach is to
try and help inform and educate team members so that they are at least in a
position to evaluate and weigh the various claims, assertions and lies
that they are being confronted with by protestors and corrupt news media as
well. The idea of "second-sourcing" - taking at least a moment to
check out/confirm the latest factoid, rumor or news hit before jumping fully
into the pool - was a seemingly obvious concept which sadly and largely gave
way to the "hurry up" world we now live in. No one really has enough
time for anything or is willing to spend what time they do have trying to get
to a better understanding of what's actually happening around them. Having a
simple and readily available "second source" - to look for just a
moment before you or your people waste time leaping down another rabbit hole -
seems to be a worthwhile investment. After all, how much is it worth to know the truth?
We're now living in a
world where everyone's their own expert on everything. As the Chicago traders
used to say, until you have a position and something concrete and meaningful on
the line, all you have is an ephemeral opinion, subject to change, and relatively
worthless. Managers of large institutions, and especially public technology
businesses, are not typically encouraged by their boards or investors to stand
out on disputed and controversial issues or to raise their voices above the
consensus. But true leaders understand that -- whatever the risks may be --
certain core ideas and principles are worth promoting and protecting.
Principles and solid
beliefs are far more valuable and substantial than mere opinions. They're worth
standing up for, taking risks where required, and even making sacrifices for -
if those become necessary. Sundar Pichai had the guts to stand up and draw a
line. He made Google a leader in the battle to take back control of the
conversation. He made it clear that the office isn't the proper venue for these
complex and painful matters. We should all thank him for his honesty, courage,
and leadership.