The executive order issued by President Trump on Friday that bans refugees and other travelers from seven majority-Muslim countries hit the business community squarely between the eyes over the weekend. The move left many leaders scrambling to understand how the order would affect their employees, partners, and customers.
Some were very clear from the beginning.
The CEOs of Facebook, Twitter, Google and Apple all issued strong statements against the ban. Google created a crisis fund of $2 million with a provision for an additional $2 million in contributions from employees, for four organizations: the American Civil Liberties Union, Immigrant Legal Resource Center, International Rescue Committee, and UNHCR. It’s Google’s largest crisis campaign to date. Google co-founder and Alphabet president Sergey Brin even showed up at a protest at the San Francisco International Airport.
J.P. Morgan’s operating committee issued a memo to staff, affirming its commitment to its international employees. Mark Parker, CEO of Nike issued a strong and emotional statement to employees, denouncing the ban in no uncertain terms. Starbucks Chairman Howard Schultz vowed to employ 10,000 refugees globally over the next five years, landing the company in the middle of another tweetstorm. Even the conservative Koch brothers opposed the ban.
Ride-hailing company Lyft co-founders John Zimmer and Logan Green pledged to donate $1 million to the ACLU over the next four years, offering a sharp counterpoint to competitor Uber, whose CEO Travis Kalanick has been roundly criticized for his ties to the Trump administration. When he allowed Uber drivers to break a strike conducted by NYC cab drivers in support of protests at JFK’s Terminal Four, a lively #deleteuber campaign quickly followed.
Academics gathered at MIT and took to the streets with signs and chants for inclusion. Tech investors Chris Sacca, Fred Wilson and Mark Pincus were among many who pledged monetary support for the ACLU. (The organization confirmed to raceAhead that it received 356,306 donations totaling nearly $24.2 million over the weekend.)
Travel company CEOs weighed in as well. Expedia’s CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, who is an immigrant from Iran, left nothing open to misinterpretation: “The President’s order represents the worst of his proclivity toward rash action versus thoughtfulness. Ours is a nation of immigrants. These are our roots, this is our soul. All erased with the stroke of a pen.”
But for others, the math is not so simple. My colleague, Geoff Colvin, describes the conundrum many executives now face, in today’s must-read Power Sheet:
What do you do if you’re a famous CEO, and the president of the United States has asked you to serve on his Strategic and Policy Forum, and you’ve agreed to do so – and then the president issues an order forbidding some of your employees from entering the U.S., or from returning home if they live here and were out of the country?
What do you do if you’re a famous CEO, and the president of the United States has asked you to serve on his Strategic and Policy Forum, and you’ve agreed to do so – and then the president issues an order forbidding some of your employees from entering the U.S., or from returning home if they live here and were out of the country?
It is an unforgiving position for business leaders. I expect versions of this conundrum to continue, unabated for the foreseeable future. It’s already dredging up some other challenging conversations, like the tech industry’s complicated relationship with immigration policy by virtue of its support of the H-1B visa program. These conversations, combined with the larger issues of diversity, and bringing “your whole self to work” at a time at a time of bans and protests seems like a tall order.
But one thing is certain: The revolution will be leaked and tweeted and discussed. As painful as they are, these conversations are about who we are as citizens, employees, colleagues, community members and friends. Nothing ever gets solved by not talking about it.
Clarity, which feels in short supply in chaotic times, may be the most important corporate value of all.