Company leadership teams bracing for the corporate version of the pro-Palestinian protests that have disrupted U.S. colleges over the past week should remember this basic tenet of crisis management: The best way to avoid a crisis is to manage it before it happens.
As tensions around the issue escalate, the obvious next target is companies, particularly those that do business with Israel. Protests already hit Google in early April, with employees criticizing the US$1.2-billion contract the company shares with Microsoft to provide cloud-computing services to the Israeli government.
Google’s response? The company fired them all, 50 people in total, and issued a strong warning to those considering similar actions.
“Behaviour like this has no place in our workplace and we will not tolerate it,” Google’s head of global security, Chris Rackow, said in a hard-line all-employee memo. “If you are one of the few who are tempted to think we’re going to overlook conduct that violates our policies, think again.”
While Google is the first high-profile example of dissension within corporate ranks, other companies have been targeted by campus protesters. Students have called for institutions such as Columbia University to divest their endowment portfolios of companies that do business with Israel, including Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet and Lockheed Martin.
Companies that don’t do business in the conflict-torn region should not feel immune. The spread of such protests, fuelled by social media and a generational FOMO that often transcends any understanding of an issue, makes every company vulnerable to collateral splatter.
The issue reflects the continued growth of political and social activism, born during the social-justice movement and driven by rising employee entitlement, which is causing crises that have little or nothing to do with the quality or performance of the products and services companies sell. Just ask Wayfair, the online home-décor company, which saw hundreds of workers stage a walkout in 2019 to protest U.S. immigration policy and call out the company for selling goods to a government contractor hired to furnish immigrant detention centres along the U.S.-Mexico border.
These are not the typical product crises – exploding Ford Pintos, poisoned Tylenol or doors falling off Boeing aircraft. These are issues typically beyond the control of executive leadership and boards of directors, but they are increasingly material in their effect on market valuation and brand reputation.
And they are putting leadership to the test. Will leaders let the activist tails wag the corporate dogs or crack down like Google did?
It is not about whether or not a company agrees with a cause. It is about the fact companies are not – or should not be – platforms for social or political grandstanding. Leaders need to remember that and remind their stakeholders of it. Besides, there’s no shortage of other platforms people can use to air grievances or proffer arguments.
Beware of taking the conciliatory stance. Look what happened at Columbia, where pandering to the protesters led to an escalation of the problem, with agitators barricading themselves in a campus building before being arrested during a police raid.
Add to that the professionalization of protesters. Many universities are reporting that the majority of those involved in campus demonstrations are not students or faculty at all, but rather professional protesters hired by partisan groups and individuals bent on making political hay. Escalation is their objective – and they are incented to do it.
If you are looking for guidance, Google’s posture is a good place to start. Swift, direct and tied to existing company policy, not politics. But also look at some of the highly ranked schools that have no-nonsense strategies.
At Tulane University in New Orleans, the critical line between free speech and hate speech was made abundantly clear.
“We fundamentally respect the right to protest,” its head of public safety and community engagement, Kirk Bouyelas, said in a memo to students and parents. “Free speech is foundational to our society and a bedrock tenet of universities. However, breaking the law, hate speech, harassment, intimidation, trespassing, violence and other criminal acts will not be tolerated.”
The school walked the walk, too, suspending several student protesters and shutting down a campus group it says was inciting disruptive activity. It also warned faculty and staff that such behaviour would trigger disciplinary action, including termination.
At Washington University in St. Louis, the message was similarly blunt: Students who participate in disruptive activity face sanctions, including expulsion.
The University of Florida took an even tougher stance, warning would-be student demonstrators that they would be banned from attending the school for three years. The administration underlined the point by saying the school is not a daycare for protesters wanting to pitch tents on the quad.
There’s an old saying: It’s better to have something you need and not use it than not have it and need it. Company leaders should put in place an action plan in the event they are targeted as this issue heats up and, since dealing with disruptive activism is now the normal course in business, keep it updated for the next one.
Remember, hoping this doesn’t happen at your company is not a viable option. So when the board and investors ask if you are prepared – as they should – have a comprehensive and credible plan designed to protect the needs of the business and to avoid buckling under pressure from protesters.
Gus Carlson is a U.S.-based columnist for The Globe and Mail.