Ship of Fools: Should Dead Horse Views Prevent You From Running a Company

Thread: Should Dead Horse Views Prevent You From Running a Company Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by Hairy Biker (# 12086) on :

Brendan Eich, clearly a brilliant technologist, has been force to resign from the Mozilla Corporation, specifically because of what he has publicly stated he believes about gay marriage.

Now, without getting into the rights and wrongs of his views (or we'll end up in DH), what do shipmates think of this? Does the CEO's view on this issue, however publicly declared, have any bearing on his ability to run the company? Have we come to a kind of inverse-Orwellian point in our society, where the thought-mob are able to control our opinions?

Posted by Antisocial Alto (# 13810) on :

Maybe being dumb enough to shoot off his mouth in public about a controversial belief that has nothing to do with his company's products means he's not fit to be CEO. Presumably he ought to know something about PR. Like not pissing off a bunch of people for no reason.

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

Given that Mozilla has employees who are in same-sex relationships, knowing that their boss is bothered enough to donate money to organisations that actively work to prevent their regularising them within law... that's awkward for all concerned.

However, customers who are in same-sex relationships, and their friends, are free to firstly, not use Mozilla products, and secondly, tell Mozilla why they're not.

You could simply put this down to a good, old-fashioned consumer boycott, of which there have been plenty in the past, and undoubtedly will be plenty in the future.

So, arguably, simply holding Dead Horse views won't prevent you from running a company. Being publicly known as an activist for or against those views is going to a different level. Those consumers and employees who are sufficiently bothered one way or another, will vote with their feet.

Posted by stonespring (# 15530) on :

I already started a thread on this in DH. If he had donated money to a campaign to ban interracial marriage, would people's attitudes be different? No one would have questioned pressuring him to resign. And people would probably be more tolerant (maybe) if he had donated to a campaign to ban abortions.

I think political donations should be public - so many if the huge donations to "social welfare groups" of the KochBrothers and Karl Rove are not subject to disclosure. But then you get people forced to resign for their donations like this. But this is different than just donating to a party or candidate.

The majority in the tech industry especially see same sex marriage as a moral and human rights issue and not so much as a religious freedom or freedom of conscience issue.
Maybe it would be different in a different industry. But people can boycott anything. Still, being a religious conservative is really tough as an executive in the tech industry - even if you keep it private except for making political donations.

I don't know how to discuss this without getting into the DH issue of how same sex marriage is different from (or not different from) other civil rights and religious issues.

Posted by Hairy Biker (# 12086) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:

You could simply put this down to a good, old-fashioned consumer boycott, of which there have been plenty in the past, and undoubtedly will be plenty in the future.

But the don't often lead to newly appointed heads rolling in such short order. What happened to the bosses of Starbucks and Amazon when they were called out on tax practices? They were able to ride that storm. It's more than a boycott, I would suggest.

Posted by Fr Weber (# 13472) on :

There's no evidence so far that he's tried to run Mozilla according to his personal beliefs. So he gave some money to a controversial cause. So what?

Criticizing him for it is fine. Calling for his ouster because of political contributions (which he made from his own money, not from the company's funds) is disgusting. If he were an entry-level employee who got fired for posting a marriage-equality flyer in his cubicle, there would be a shitstorm (led by the very people who are now baying for him to be sacked, no doubt).

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Hairy Biker:

quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:

You could simply put this down to a good, old-fashioned consumer boycott, of which there have been plenty in the past, and undoubtedly will be plenty in the future.

But the don't often lead to newly appointed heads rolling in such short order. What happened to the bosses of Starbucks and Amazon when they were called out on tax practices? They were able to ride that storm. It's more than a boycott, I would suggest.

Yes, they were able to ride out that storm, but that was because the boycott wasn't effective enough. If it had been, they would have gone.

Mozilla is a company that relies on the good will of both its employees and its customers, putting it in a more vulnerable position than say, Amazon, which enjoys an almost monopsonic position. (Amazon could probably sacrifice a kitten every time someone placed an order and still enough people would use it...)

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Fr Weber:
Calling for his ouster because of political contributions (which he made from his own money, not from the company's funds) is disgusting.

Why? I can choose to do business with who I want (as are you), and I'm free to make pubic what my conditions are to conduct business with any company (as are you).

If the boss of HugeCorp was giving money to build Wahhabi mosques across the US, you'd be cool with that, right?

Posted by Nicolemr (# 28) on :

Seems to me that it's a matter of degree. Simply holding odious beliefs should be a personal, private thing.

Making them public becomes problematical. If you annoy enough people there will be a reaction. And making a big enough noise about them does make questionable fitness... as someone pointed out it's bad PR for the company and that's a problem. And the problem with employee relations too.

Where this case lies in the continuum between the two extremes, between holding beliefs privately and making a big noise about them, probably closer to the first. Much as it makes me queasy to admit it, if all he did was donate a contribution to a cause, not get on a soap box about it, he should probably get a pass.

Posted by Horseman Bree (# 5290) on :

So: how is it different between Mozilla having a boss who wants to dictate whether some of his employees get to marry or the boss of Hobby Lobby wanting to dictate the conditions by which some of his employees have sex?

Mozilla is precarious because the clientele and its own work force can't see the connection between one's marriage and the work that the company does - but bad labour relations will destroy the company.

Hobby Lobby gets away with it because...they rely on hiring docile minimum-wage workers who can't question company policy? because the customers of HL don't give a rat's ass about employment conditions? (Cheap is all in small-item sales) because they only sell in anti-gay states?

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

There is already a thread in Dead Horses on this very theme and that is the right place for this discussion. I'm closing this thread and linking the posts here to the DH thread.

Barnabas62
Purgatory Host.

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

Minor adjustment. To avoid losing the link to these posts, I'm moving the thread to DH then closing it again.

B62
Purg Host

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