I supervise a talented employee who’s passionate about his work. Unfortunately, “Johnny” feels equally passionate about political issues. He floods his coworkers’ inboxes with unsolicited, strongly worded emails about Palestine. If he encounters colleagues in the breakroom, he initiates strident conversations he dominates. When others try to interrupt him or voice contrary views, Johnny grows increasingly didactic and self-righteous.
I’ve attempted to rein him in, but it hasn’t worked. Our last discussion ended in a stalemate, with him saying, “If there’s no space for me in this workplace as a person who cares about what’s happening in the world, you won’t need to fire me. I’ll leave.” He then began pushing our executive team to take a strong public stance in favor of the Palestinians in Gaza.
If Johnny leaves, it’ll be hard to replace his technical skill set. Also, I agree with many of his views, and he’s done great things for our company, from getting us to recycle to improving our social media visibility. But those forced to interact with him daily complain about him, and it’s coming to a head. The chief operating officer recently told me, “Leash him or get rid of him.”
The HR manager and I plan to meet with Johnny tomorrow, and I don’t want to lose him. How do we proceed?
Answer:
Frame the discussion you have with him in positive terms. You respect Johnny’s passion, advocacy, and talent. He needs to respect others. His colleagues aren’t his acolytes. Give him guidance on when and how to share his views.
Employees care deeply about climate change, abortion, gun control, the horrific Hamas attacks on October 7th, the devastation in Gaza, and what’s happening in the Ukraine. As a result, highly charged discussions will occur in the workplace because employees don’t shut off their emotions or brains when they enter the workplace.
As I wrote in an earlier article, employers and employees need to up their game, , https://workplacecoachblog.com/2023/05/political-discussions-in-the-workplace/. Although others in their workplace hold views different from our own, we can respectfully talk with and not at each other. We can’t remain a country in which we avoid differences of opinions because we don’t remember how to exchange ideas without attacking other’s views and each other as people.
So, tell Johnny he’ll be more successful in advocating his views if he improves how he presents them. Can he understand others don’t share his views, and many of his colleagues don’t want to discuss these issues at work? Can he stop flooding others’ inboxes with his opinions?
Meanwhile, similar fierce battles now rage in many workplaces. Employees proclaim, “I’m a person who cares about what’s happening in the world, and the world is self-destructing with climate change and violence. I don’t leave my brain behind when I enter the workplace and need to speak out to create positive change.”
Employers present an equally legitimate view. “We pay employees to work. We don’t want them disrupting their workplace by foisting their opinions on coworkers who hold different views.” Many of these employers fired employees who wrote contentious social media posts about Hamas’s horrific October 7th attacks and the subsequent war in Gaza, https://www.wsj.com/tech/google-fires-28-employees-for-protesting-companys-cloud-deal-with-israel-382f4a50?mod=article_inline.
Starbucks sued its employees’ union representing 410 of its U.S. stores after local affiliates of Starbucks Works United posted pro-Palestinian social media posts that angered hundreds of customers, https://apnews.com/article/starbucks-workers-united-union-lawsuit-israel-palestinian-f212a994fef67f122854a4df7e5d13f5.
Further, multiple employers have lost patience with employees pressuring them to take public stands on issues such as the war in Gaza. Google fired 28 employees who disrupted their workplace when protesting their company’s cloud-computer contract with the Israeli government. Google’s CEO emailed Google employees reminding them, “This is a business, and not a place to act in a way that disrupts co-workers or makes them feel unsafe, to attempt to use the company as a personal platform.” In contrast, an employee said, “I wasn’t expecting that my labor would be going toward aiding a genocide….” https://www.wsj.com/tech/google-fires-28-employees-for-protesting-companys-cloud-deal-with-israel-382f4a50?mod=article_inline.
Finally, if Johnny refuses to change, he gives you an ultimatum you might need to accept, so he doesn’t continue holding you and others within earshot hostage to his soapbox.
You can find valuable resources for handling employee conflicts in Navigating Conflict, https://amzn.to/3rCKoWj.
© 2024 Lynne Curry, PhD, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
I was taught early, and still believe, that highly charged topics should be left out of workplace discussions- frankly, out of most discussions. I absolutely agree with your point that we need to be able to have civil discourse, I just don’t know that I agree those discussions should occur within the workplace. Employers pay people to produce a certain goods or service. I do think your suggestions for the employer to discuss with Johnny are good and would add one more- “If someone says they don’t want to talk about it, you need to stop talking about it with them. Otherwise you’re not being passionate, you’re being a bully, and that won’t be tolerated.”
Great comment, Dee!
Johnny likes his own opinions but others’ aren’t “as equal” as his. He has rewritten his job description to advocating for his vision of corporate responsibility, right now, about Hamas, Gaza, and Palestinians, tomorrow about whatever other geopolitical conflict strikes his fancy. Creating workplace drama in lieu of actually doing mandated work is not OK. Nor is claiming that his free-speech rights are being tampered with. He’s far more successful at getting away from doing meaningful work. It’s nice to see that when he works, he is very effective and helpful to the organization, but this seems to be hard to predict.
Totally agreed.