The post in full doesn't read at all like it was to stimulate discussion. It reads more like it was to silence dissent.

If you really wanted to stimulate discussion and gather employee views on this stuff, you'd send a survey round. But the relationship is still asymmetrical between boss and employee.

All you're doing when posting something like this semi-publicly is creating an environment where more quiet conscientious views get shouted down by the loudest voices.

Which makes his response read all that more hollow. Calling it a straw man? The post seems to have been an all out justification for immoral behavior by an executive. I can't imagine a Jr. Engineer or someone fresh out of college with their MA in Stats feeling super comfortable hopping in and going, "Hey this sound unethical and if people saw you saying it they would think we're hella fucked up." I'm relatively low-ranking at another big SV company and the thought of needing to stand up to a high ranking employee like that is more than a little intimidating.

And not just that, but to be expected to "contribute to a discussion" in such a way that all your coworkers can see. I think as somebody who takes objection to that memo I'd probably be more inclined look for alternative work.

That's good though. Boz already made the decision to prioritize connecting more people, despite the costs. He didn't have to tell his employees, but he did. This allows you to make the decision on whether it's worth staying at Facebook.

But I’d sure as hell take that situation over many others I’ve had where my only contact with execs is through occasional, content-free memos.

But yes, the people in power do tend to be heard more in internal debate. (Not necessarily just managers though. Good or controversial writers can also have a lot of influence.) And this does mean more soft-spoken people sometimes don't get an equal voice.

Online discussions are often more heat than light. I don't think internal discussion can be replaced by surveys, though? They're both useful.

There are also problems that equality doesn't fix. As the number of people scales up, the power of each person gets smaller. Filling out a survey when you know it's one of hundreds or thousands tends not to feel very empowering, or even a good use of your time.

They canned an employee for saying something unpopular they disagreed with.

The fact that this went such a different way says something. Maybe that something is "the cultures of Google and Facebook are so different it explains the discrepancy." But maybe it's "Facebook wanted to float this as an ethical trial balloon."

Basically this is the end of the tech world and all those people who used to join these firms because they believed tech would make the world a better place.

Now its going to be pretty much closed communication and minimal interaction internally. IF you have an issue, well tough balls, tech is no longer good for that - god forbid it shows up on HN. If it shows up on the media thats career suicide.

I suspect its probably time for HN to be shut down soon as well.

If he actually believed that stuff, it would be extraordinary scary. I don’t think he does.

Trolling is a terrible leadership technique.

Boz’s pieces over the last few years tend to fall into the “Strong opinions, weakly held” category. I also suspect he argues a point that is stronger in sentiment than he really believes, to help his message stand out.

He can’t come back and say he didn’t mean it. Besides, if he was trying to spark debate, doesn’t that mean he though my it was even potentially justifiable to use unethical practices to drive growth?

In my daily casual conversations with co-workers and friends, the topic is very rarely raised, and only to speculate why the timing of the issue seems to tied to a rise in conservative politics.

I'm not going to make any assertions about the intent of the meme because I don't know the context, but the logic expressed in the meme seems to have been their strategy already to me, from the outside.

Yes, and there were discussions internally about this. One could argue that the recent shift from promoting pages content to promoting your friends content might have been the result of that.

most of the justifications for it to appear as dissent silencing will have to be post fact justifications as a result.

I would never be tempted to suspend disbelief that this one time my opinion, effort, goodwill actually mattered.

I've fallen for the "trust us" scam too many times. Embarrassing. Ever more, the only thing I trust is mutual distrust.

I like the idea of employees having open discussions about company policy and direction, but I would never would have believed such a thing could exist at enormous companies like Facebook and Google. Though, given headlines recently, I'm not sure it will survive much longer.

This just reveals how big the power imbalance is between employees and executives that we’d have to make such decisions.

Speaking up internally when you’re not on the board often doesn’t get much done. At least if it’s a moral objection.

Depending what it is, speaking up externally might not get you more pull with internal decision-makers? Particularly if they feel betrayed.

Or, maybe a big external stink could cause action? Depends what it is.

It's quite possible that neither would work, and then you've burned your bridges for nothing.

That's a false dichotomy. I'd like to work for an employer that would not mind me discussing my work related stuff outside without immediately classifying that as a leak, and I'd like my employer to trust my judgment in knowing what is and what is not appropriate in such discussions.

I left Facebook for a place where the stakes are a lot lower, but information leaks like a sieve.

It’s really disheartening to know that a lot of new coworkers would prefer to leak their “spin” to the press and actively try to damage the company when they don’t get their way.

If it's good for the goose it is good for the gander and companies with this much influence on the world should welcome transparency, not oppose it. And if they do not welcome transparency then we'll have to help them along a bit every now and then.

I think the reality with FB is that the current idealized system is not necessarily the best, and likewise, the occurrence of leaks is not necessarily a sign of impending doom. Sometimes leaks are a necessary symptom for when an organization has gone off the rails and has failed to self-correct. I don’t think any organization enjoys or wants leaks — just as no human enjoys sneezing or diarrhea — but sometimes the temporary discomfort is necessary for long-term health.

It's ironic to see employees complaining about what is essentially a lack of privacy, when the company they work for goes out of its way to convince everybody that privacy is a thing of the past, and in so many words, so does the very Bosworth post they would protect and keep private. Eat your own dog food.

And then one of them says that whoever leaked the post (the whistleblower, is how I would refer to them) lacks integrity. Integrity? You work for Facebook. Has it never occurred to you that maybe you're the baddies?

A corporate code of silence that insists on the absolute privacy of internal communications is similar to the Mafia's code of silence, in which it's considered bad form (punishable by death) to blab to the authorities:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omert%C3%A0

"Omertà is a code of honor that places importance on silence, non-cooperation with authorities, and non-interference in the illegal actions of others."

It will be interesting to see what kind of documents this and other whistleblowers will decide to leak in the future. Facebook needs its own Snowden to expose its inner workings.

[1] I suspect that the corporate obsession with secrecy we're seeing here is not unique to Facebook. What's unique is the irony of a privacy-destroying company insisting on its own right to privacy.

Employers which still use trust at scale are ignoring their risk analysts. The risk of a secret leaking is proportional to the number of people who know the secret. You can reduce the risk with Stasi-style surveillance, or legal enforcement (e.g. legally classified state secrets), but few people wish to work under those conditions.

It's a false dichotomy because people would rather work for an employer that trusts them with the secrets they need to get their job done, and doesn't trust them with the secrets they don't need, a.k.a. the principle of least access. Openness in organizations is important insofar as people can attain access to information they need when they need it, but not unlimited access to everything, which ultimately reduces organizational trust when leaks inevitably occur.

I'm a contractor, in the same team of FTE devs for a year, it's going really well, but I was a little hurt when I realised they were reading CVs to fill a vacancy in the team without putting me in the loop.

Edit: I understand why they are doing it, I mean I'm from a big consulting company (Alten), but still it stung a little, especially since I'm on pretty good term with the rest of the team.

Personally, I’d rather be in the dark about policy than be schnookered into thinking that I have some meaningful input.

It seems apt that internal debates and posts would leak to the outside world.