On Apr 7, 2014, at 16:07, Boris Zbarsky <[email protected]> wrote:
> On 4/7/14 2:40 PM, Dennis Culley wrote:
>> Most organization do not approve of employees using the company name to 
>> espouse their own personal views.
> 
> Most organizations suck in all sorts of ways, sure.
> 
> I think there is a clear difference between saying "I work for Mozilla, and I 
> think that X" and saying "Mozilla thinks that X" or "I speak for Mozilla and 
> I think that X".
> 
> The latter two are not acceptable in general.  The former is acceptable in 
> general, especially because the employment status in question is generally 
> not particularly secret.

I don't think this distinction has much weight in practice. This Hacker News 
comment [0] explains it very well so I'll just post it here verbatim:

--
Companies need to send out an email to all employees every morning reminding 
them of the most basic law of corporate communications:
"When you speak to a customer, reporter, friend, or any other person not 
employed by $Company about $Company-related matters, you are acting as a public 
representative of $Company.

Regardless of whom you speak to or in what context, you must assume your words 
will be repeated to the entire world as $Company  policy.

Your words will be read/heard and interpreted by people of every conceivable 
level of intelligence and education, in every conceivable cultural context. 
Even people who have never heard of $Company before and know absolutely nothing 
about $Company or the matters you are discussing will form opinions based on 
your words.

People more intelligent, better educated, and more experienced than you in the 
matters you are speaking about will also read and interpret your words. Then 
they will speak publicly about them, and further influence others' opinions of 
$Company.

There are no exceptions."
--

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7540565

-- reuben
_______________________________________________
governance mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/governance

Reply via email to