Someone at GitLab just made a suggestion to change the wording of the policy that I merged https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/www-gitlab-com/merge_requests/...
(as someone who moved from github to gitlab, and is now open to other options).
I like this. I like this a lot.
I've never been a fan of the way the Contributors Code of Conduct does explicitly allow for people to have opinions of their own outside the projects so long as they don't try to represent those opinions as being a representative of the project.
If it had, and offered remedies, the guy in the Opal situation could have just removed Opal from his Twitter profile, instead of being asked to leave the project.
It used to say:
We do not currently exclude anyone from being a customer based on moral/value grounds.
followed by a list of reasons why not. It now says:
In some circumstances, we may opt to not work with particular organizations, but we assess those on a case-by-case basis. Some reasons we may choose not to work with certain entities include, but are not limited to ... Making derogatory statements ... Encouraging violence or discrimination against protected groups.
Worse, it looks like you just reversed direction because the Register made fun of you. You went from being willing to work with all organisations to reserving the right to drop any organisation on a whim. I wonder, what does Gitlab believe exactly?
You aren't the CEO but apparently the actual CEO lets you set global sales policy, so perhaps you can illustrate with some examples how your new-new policy will work.
I ask because the edited policy looks more like a personal speech code than something designed for companies. Do software development organisations routinely "encourage violence towards protected groups"? They don't, in my experience. So which organisations did you have in mind when writing it? Who exactly will you refuse to do business with now who would have been served before? You list some categorisations that look quite vague and state it's not a full list.
For example, in recent times certain political factions have argued that immigration control is violence against protected groups: can you clarify if you do/would sell Gitlab to ICE?
Honestly, you could submit and merege request to our handbook to change global sales policy and tag our CEO to review and merge if he agrees :) Admittedly, this is a unique way to run a company. Other companies are limited by only getting ideas from a small group of people that are directors and executives. At GitLab we understand that good ideas can come from anywhere and we embrace that.
Ultimately the values of a company must come from the CEO, as he is the only person who can enforce them. Your CEO can and does decide what the policy is, the fact that he uses PRs to do so is a distraction. But it appears he either doesn't know what he believes or his beliefs are so weak that criticism from some random journalist or marketing woman is sufficient to change them completely.
We currently use GitHub. Microsoft isn't perfect but its position on selling to customers is pretty well established: they sell to anyone who uses computers, and always have. Satya Nadella does not reverse his companies policies because someone filed a pull request. This is reassuring. I don't want to ever be in a situation where Chrissie Buchanan, a blog writer of no importance at all, gets to influence our business relationships because who the hell knows when she might decide that her personal "values" don't include doing business with us? What even are her values? She refuses to explain when asked: just more evidence GitLab makes it up as it goes along.
I have nothing against your software. Other than the fact you're a distributed company and make a GitHub competitor, I didn't know much or have any opinions about you before this incident. But frankly this looks astonishingly unprofessional. Businesses want certainty and you give none.
But violence against non-protected groups is ok, I guess.
There is a increasing divide splitting the American people, and the fronts are hardening more and more. I know a company is not a place to heal the nation, but the wider the gap becomes, the more difficult it becomes for the people to actually discuss their views and develop understanding for one another - as opposed to yelling at each other (and "F* T." is close to that).
Whatever your stance on that EO or T. or the whole state of politics is: I think instead of outright banning discussions of politics (or are violations against the CoC not enforced?), you should maybe try to foster a culture of "you're neither required disclose your political views nor to participate in political discussions, but if you do either, be constructive and accept that others might have a different opinion.".
(Or something in that general direction - I don't have too much time today to produce a nice and watertight formulation of this ;-))
I don’t quite see how they could effectively do that, but the possibility is there.
(Yes, I realize it would be social suicide, but while I understand that this is theoretically a bad thing, I just cannot quite apply it to Trump supporters)
The new ban on politics would ban them from defending Trump or EO13769 in the workplace. Before the ban they could have defended Trump and EO13769, and the following discussion would have likely devolved even further than just "'F* Trump', written out".
But even before that it just seemed like a "guideline" to me rather than a strict "rule" that was actively enforced, and it was introduced years ago before we had a proper Code of Conduct in place.
You might need to clarify what legal jurisdiction you apply to those rules. California's definitions? Another U.S. state? Another country? As a global company where illegality varies by country, I think those statements present an opportunity for different interpretations without clarification.
- Related topic: We generally don't discuss religion or politics.....
Too much waffling added. Political discussion in the workplace can devolve into a hostile work environment.
I'd suggest this simplification of the two versions: We do not discuss politics in the workplace. However, we encourage discussion and iteration on any company policy.
Don't get me wrong, I welcome it, and if the most we can get I feel like it is acceptable. However calling it a "change of wording" is a bit dishonest, really you reverted it completely in response to the negative feedback.