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Comment by tyingq | Hacker News Reader

There's 2 quotes from an Amazon spokesperson there:

“We support every employee’s right to criticize their employer’s working conditions, but that does not come with blanket immunity against our internal policies, all of which are lawful,” said Jaci Anderson, an Amazon spokeswoman. “We terminated these employees not for talking publicly about working conditions, safety or sustainability but, rather, for repeatedly violating internal policies.”

Ms. Anderson, the Amazon spokeswoman, said the company disagreed with allegations made in Mr. Bailey’s case. “We are proud to provide inclusive environments, where employees can excel without fear of retaliation, intimidation or harassment,” she said.

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There's also a response to one of those reasons.

> After Amazon told them that they had violated its external communications policy by speaking publicly about the business, their group organized 400 employees to also speak out, purposely violating the policy to make a point.

So, Amazon fired then for publicly speaking about the business. Their statement saying that it was for violating internal policy seems deliberately misleading, because the internal policy that was broken was to not speak publicly. That Amazon had a policy against speaking publicly is not a point in Amazon's favor.

> That Amazon had a policy against speaking publicly is not a point in Amazon's favor.

Not to defend Amazon, but on this point, every job I've ever had included a policy that amounted to "do not speak publicly about the business."

Do others think this is unusual?

There are specific rights in this regard.

https://www.natlawreview.com/article/can-you-terminate-emplo...

> In a memo released on April 15, the agency evaluated a case where a company maintained a policy that prohibited employees from speaking to the media at any time. The NLRB found this rule to be unlawful and explained: “Employees have a statutory right to speak publically about their complaints or concerns with their terms and conditions of employment, including to the press, without employer authorization.”

> In other words, employees have a right under the National Labor Relations Act generally to discuss their employment – including with the press. Based on the finding that the policy was unlawful, the NLRB also found that the company violated labor law when it terminated two employees pursuant to the policy for speaking to the media about a workplace issue. A more narrowly tailored policy may have passed muster, but the broad media prohibition, in this case, crossed the line.

But these two were not speaking about the “terms and conditions” of their employment. They were broadly criticizing the company on other matters ranging from climate change to more directly political issues. I feel like the scope of the NLRA is extending to include just about everything.

What? It sounds like you are implying that you need your employers permission to speak your mind, broadly, on any topic?

I'm not necessarily saying that's how it should be, but I am observing that this is how it is in practice. Otherwise what do you make of companies regularly firing people for saying something on social media or on their own time? For example Disney+ fired Gina Carano for holding certain political positions and expressing them online. It seems like left-leaning activists want it both ways - protection for their own activities but not for the activities of moderates or conservatives.

'protection for moderates or conservative' I see this opined frequently, but what specific views are in need of protection here? Real question because it usually seems like a smoke screen for troubling or racist views.

> I feel like the scope of the NLRA is extending to include just about everything.

You say this like it's a bad thing.

You've got it backwards the law allows companies certain things they can forbid people from doing not an explicit list of things employees are allowed to say [0]. Companies can only prevent employees from speaking about specific things like trade secrets or other confidential things.

[0] This would have some pretty obvious 1A implications.

It is legal to prohibit employees saying or implying that they are speaking on behalf of the company or in any capacity, but it's actually forbidden by the National Labor Relations Board to tell employees they are forbidden from saying anything about their employer (notwithstanding sensitive, confidential or classified topics).

That depends, is the policy:

a) As an employee, you are not allowed to make statements about internal matters on behalf of the company.

b) As an employee, you are not allowed to talk about internal matters outside the company.

If A, then I have no problem. Companies have PR teams and random employee #13554 might not have all the information about an issue.

If B, I have a huge problem as the first amendment is a thing that exists.

You limited B to internal matters, which generally means company confidential. Unless the matters concern legal violations (a different conversation about whistleblower regulation and protection), why on earth would you have “a huge problem” with confidentiality agreements and NDAs? Especially when you sign those agreements as a condition of employment?

When I said internal matters, I did not have any specific information in mind, just internal company matters.

If engineer #34529, profiled liked to SpaceY says on Twitter that his group has lots of overtime. He could be fired in a case B situation. And yes, information like that could be coupled with other information to figure out what projects the company is working on.

It is my belief that confidentiality agreements and NDAs, along with non-compete clauses are overbroad and expand beyond what companies are allowed to ask of their employees.

Companies regularly fire people for expressing political opinions they don't agree with. I feel that speech should be protected, but if so, it should be protected across the board for all points of views, all ideologies, and all political positions. For instance, an employee who publicly criticizes Black Lives Matter should be able to do so without risking their job. Would you be OK with that?

Unusual or not, it's still restrictive. I think it's reasonable to prohibit employees from speaking publicly on behalf of the business, but restricting speech otherwise is a pretty shitty thing to do.

Right. But it would interesting to hear how Amazon claims these employees violated internal policies. That seems newsworthy.

Their spokesperson did not wish to say what policies they claim were violated. They were presented an opportunity to state their side, and chose not to.

Maybe an intrepid journalist could find out...

Perhaps, in doing so, that journalist would discover that Amazon had no real argument for any internal policy being violated at all. Or perhaps they would discover that these employees did, in fact, violate some internal policy, whether or not their firing violated their rights.

The intrepid journalist linked to it, why is reprinting it necessary?

I generally don't like the New York Times either, but you're grasping at straws here.

Which is why these things shouldn’t be decided in a court of public opinion. If you’ve ever been involved in the employment dispute world, you know there is a lot of liability for employers talking about internal investigation matters publicly. It’s not realistic to expect Amazon or any employer to talk openly with the press about an ongoing dispute with an employee in detail. Meanwhile, an individual fighting the company has every incentive to air everything (as they understand it) and little liability for doing so. Consequently, news stories are seldom going to give you a full accounting of facts.

The spokesperson had no choice. Speaking publicly in ways that harm the company's brand is against policy, a fireable offense.

The spokesperson is a representative of the company, what they say is what the company wants said publicly about the issue. I wasn't blaming them personally, I was saying the company's point of view was given in the article.

They violated their internal policy of not talking publicly about working conditions.

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