There is no way you would fire a CEO you actually wanted in place because they had a consensual relationship with a subordinate in the past. Why are US companies always so aggressive about moralising these issues? No one would take issue if he carried a gun at work. Why is it that corporate morals rule?
A relationship between a manager and someone they manage compromises the effectiveness of both the manager and the team. As CEO, he is everyone's boss, so having a consensual relationship with anyone involved in the organisation is a bad thing.
If she got promoted, would it be because of her work, or her relationship with the boss? If she didn't get promoted, would it be because of her attitude, or her relationship with the boss? If she had an argument with a colleague, was it because she was an entitled slut? If he cut the budget of the department she worked in, was it because he was going off her?
It's pernicious and there's nothing you can do about it except simply not sleep with the people you manage.
If a CEO of a blue-chip like Intel doesn't get this basic rule of management, what other basic mistakes is he going to make? Bring a gun into work? ;)
so having a consensual relationship with anyone involved in the organisation is a bad thing ... If she got promoted, would it be because of her work, or her relationship with the boss?
I'm not sure if I buy this completely. You see, a manager is human after all which means he/she is going to like some people more than others. There is always some kind of relationship with all the others, no way around it. Now obviously if the manager is only going to look at this relationship, his/her personal affection for others and not their work, and give some advantages over others based on that relationship, yes that is bad. Seeing that, and seeing an actual romatic relationship is just a more involved type of relationship, 'simply don't sleep with the people you manage' is obviously not enough. You should be able to put all or most personal things aside. As such I think these rules of no romantic relationships are a bit strange. Even if you follow that rule, but for the rest still manage people based on your personal relationship with them, it's still bad.
Or looked at it the other way: If two people have feelings for each other but suppress resulting actions due to company policy, how would that not influence decision making?
There's a difference between the feeling, "hey that manager I pass in the halls occasionally is attractive", and "I am in love with that manager".
The first is unavoidable, and although we try to correct for it in internal hiring/promotion processes by referencing assessments from multiple persons and making a data-driven decision, the second is completely avoidable by not dating the person!
After having graduated high school, most adults don't just fall into relationships. It is reasonable to assume intent is present once the connection between two individuals can be considered a "relationship" in this context.
surely you can list the differences between a romantic / physical relationship and a purely platonic one and understand why it is bad when it comes to imbalances in power right?
Unequal treatment in the workplace due to friendship is far, far, FAR more common than due to romance. In fact, I'm not sure I've ever worked at a company of more than a few people where it didn't happen.
yeah, it's one of those things that is really hard to avoid as a manager. Naturally you like some people and don't like others. Maintaining objectivity and evaluating people on their performance despite your feelings about their personality is hard.
This is why good managers don't aim to be friends with the people they manage. You may end up being friends because of team camaraderie and the amount of time you spend in the same building, but deliberately choosing to socialise with some (but not all) of the team is a bad idea.
And exactly the same thing happens if there is a perceived friendship in the team. Was the employee promoted because of their skills or because they're mates with the boss? Were they not promoted because the boss didn't want to be seen to be promoting a friend? Did they get into that argument because they're a brown-nosing jerk that thinks they're untouchable because they go for beers with the boss every Friday?
Both kinds of relationships can lead to power imbalances though. There's nothing special about a romantic/physical relationship in that regard. One can promote their (same sex, platonic) buddy for being their buddy, just as easily as they can promote their girlfriend/boyfriend.
You can ask those same questions about any attractive person or any person with powerful family members. Does that mean we can't employ those people either?
Of course not. If a manager runs a tight ship and treats their team fairly, then there shouldn't be anything wrong with a relationship. If as a manager you can't properly separate your emotions and friendships from your management duties, you aren't going to make a good manager anyway. The manager who is going to unfairly promote the person they are seeing is also going to unfairly promote the worker who they are best friends with over the worker who best deserves the promotion.
Exactly. There are many successful cases of teachers, where their own kids are sitting in their classes.
According to the CEO logic this should not be allowed and would not work. It does. Are teachers better managers than CEO's? Apparently. But then they should get paid accordingly.
it's not about what the manager actually does. It's about the team's perception of it. He could be the best manager in the world, and have perfect separation between his emotions and his professional judgement. But the other people in the team will evaluate his decisions with the relationship in mind even if he doesn't. There will always be a question mark over his leadership decisions, even if those decisions were made for the best reasons.
what other basic mistakes is he going to make? Bring a gun into work? ;)
Why would you think that bringing a gun to work is a "mistake"? Does one's right to self-defense stop the moment they cross the threshold of their office door?
Not sure if he just got fired for a relationship or if there's something more.
But your remark about the "moralising" of US companies has also been my experience. I worked in a Europe-based office for a US-owned multinational company. Alcohol was strictly forbidden. (Needless to say, the fridge was filled regardless and late Friday afternoon, people would have a beer and fraternize.)
Wasn't this guy basically caught red handed selling shares of intel rather quickly and suspiciously right before news of the meltdown and spectre vulnerabilities were publicized.
If the board got wind of a pending investigation into that incident they might be looking to distance him from the company before the other shoe drops.
Opposite situation for me....I work for a Swiss company in a US office. They all think we are crazy for not allowing Glühwein at our Christmas....errr.....Winter party.
And there's no such thing as Friday afternoon beers in the fridge.
>No one would take issue if he carried a gun at work
You really don't think so? I'm no CEO but I imagine carrying a gun around would at least warrant some public criticism, particularly for a tech CEO in the San Francisco Bay Area.
We had a CFO bring a handgun onto company property in his car. Some one spotted it (apparently, it was in plain view in the car) and notified the police. He was given a talking-to by the cops and then by company reps. He wasn't fired at that point but he was gone in a month or two. Related? I don't know but it wouldn't surprise me.
The company is in Sunnyvale, site of the Richard Farley murders at ESL in 1988. So, yeah, I think the police would be interested in knowing his intentions.
In areas of the country where some material number of people do carry firearms (e.g. Texas), it's not uncommon to have explicit signs on company buildings that forbid firearms. I imagine that's pretty common policy at many if not most companies.
Depends. There are open carry and concealed carry licenses. Also, if you are an employee and sneak a weapon in and someone finds out, you will be fired.
Why are US companies always so aggressive about moralising these issues? No one would take issue if he carried a gun at work. Why is it that corporate morals rule?
These are short questions that probably can't ever be fully answered and require books to be answered even semi-adequately. That said, a good answer probably has some element of the U.S.'s strange relationships with sexuality and Christianity, going back to the particular kinds of European settlers who showed up here. This is often referred to as "Puritanism," although the Puritans actually had a much more complicated and less prim experience than is commonly supposed with the slur "Puritanism."
At the same time, in the last several decades (maybe 50 or 60), there have been various strands of feminism; two particularly noticeable parts could be labeled as "sex positive" (Camille Paglia is a good person to read on the subject) and... I actually can't think of a good label for the other one. But the other one actually has quite a bit in common with the old-school and religiously motivated views of sexuality as dangerous and in need of extreme restraint or channeling into "appropriate" spaces. This one has quite a bit of currency, currently, and it has a lot of continuity with past aspects of U.S. culture.
Even if the Puritans (who usually referred to themselves as 'godly') were slightly less prim about sex then some people expect, they certainly weren't keen on sex outside of marriage. (They also banned Christmas and other holiday celebrations, theatre, walking 'for fun', and smashed stained glass windows in churches, slashed and burned paintings by Rubens and others, and pulled down medieval monuments as being 'idolatrous', had serious discussions about legislating that Catholics should have to wear special clothes so everyone could recognise them. When you hear 'Puritan' think 'Christian Taliban'.)
Quoting the article: “An ongoing investigation by internal and external counsel has confirmed a violation of Intel’s non-fraternization policy, which applies to all managers.”
It's not just the specific act(s) but the fact that he knowingly broke policy, which raises the question of whether he decided other policies also didn't apply to him. CEOs have a lot of power and enormous compensation and, at least in theory, that's founded on their judgement.
Its also company policy that you should be fired on the spot for sleeping at your desk -- some kind of hold over from manufacturing that makes no sense for most office positions.
Risk exposure to lawsuit is incomparable to the relationship case but it was consensual.
Yeah, and if the CEO was sleeping at his desk it'd be reasonable to either reprimand him or expect him to spend 30 seconds rescinding that policy because “the rules are for you but not me” has a terrible effect on morale.
"Why are US companies always so aggressive about moralising these issues?"
Not just in the US but almost everywhere people tend to extremize moral reactions to the point their judgement in a situation is being impaired. Generally morals are used to drive people actions away from cold rational reasoning, and they also make strong arguments during war time or elections.
Unrelated, but strong example: take a toy gun and a sex toy then ask 1000 people if they would let their children play with one or the other or both. Pretty sure all of them would say no to the sex toy in disgust (which would be my reply as well, just to be clear), but most wouldn't mind letting their kids play with the toy gun. That would be a pretty normal reaction, so no problem here, apparently.
But we can also describe a sex toy as a device to simulate the act of creating a life, and a toy gun as a device to simulate the act of taking away a life, so the question would be: why our morals which rightly prevent us from giving dildos to children don't prevent us from giving them toy guns as well?
Is it really acceptable for a manger to have sexual relations with direct reports in other countries? That seems so 1950s Mad Men era from an American perspective
Politics. People use whatever they can to take each other down at that level. Which is why they get paid so much. For their mindless ambition and to put up with each others mindless ambition.
Let’s say he promotes the subordinate over a few other candidates who all thought they were worthy? You’ve just killed the corporate culture and reputation for meritocracy.
It is pretty scandalous. If it ever became public, the board would look really bad, so even if they didn’t want to fire him they probably had little choice but to.
I really liked that you skipped over what that ballot initiative was. He donated in support of Prop 8, an attempt to ban same-sex marriage in California. As a former Mozilla employee, I'm pretty glad that he was ousted for his homophobia. Good riddance.
So am I not allowed to be in US / US company / Any US company top position , that due to my religion and belief is against Gay Marriage, and can not support it ? Are those religion now deemed evil by US ? My / Our way or the high way ?
It was an opinion on marriage, a millenia-old quasi-political-religious traditional institution. The world is full of such opinions. Polygamy is illegal in 50 of 50 United states, even California.
Don't slip on that edge of political wrongthink.
Communism is certainly the most damaging political movement of the 20th century. Should we oust Communist sympathizers from their positions of power?
Laws prohibiting same sex marriage and laws prohibiting polygamy limit people from marrying people that they choose.
Why should the state be okay with two men getting married to each other and not two men getting married to the same woman? Or three women all getting married to each other?
Being anti gay marriage isn't necessarily homophobic. I'm a straight male in the middle of a divorce, and I share an apartment with a gay male friend. Divorce is an ugly and painful process, and the only sure way to avoid it is to avoid marriage. Gay marriage will inevitably mean gay divorce. Haven't gay people suffered enough already?
