Apple CEO Tim Cook faces significant employee unrest
MacDailyNews Webmaster
Apple, known among its Silicon Valley peers for a secretive corporate culture in which workers are expected to be in lock step with management, is suddenly facing an issue that would have been unthinkable a few years ago: employee unrest, DNYUZ reports.
Apple CEO Tim CookOn Friday, Tim Cook, Apple’s chief executive, answered questions from workers in an all-staff meeting for the first time since the public surfacing of employee concerns over topics ranging from pay equity to whether the company should assert itself more on political matters like Texas’ restrictive abortion law.
Mr. Cook answered only two of what activist employees said were a number of questions they had wanted to ask in a meeting broadcast to employees around the world, according to a recording obtained by The New York Times. But his response was a notable acknowledgment that the workplace and social issues that have been roiling Silicon Valley for several years have taken root at Apple.
Over the past month, more than 500 people who said they were current and former Apple employees have submitted accounts of verbal abuse, sexual harassment, retaliation and discrimination at work, among other issues, to an employee-activist group that calls itself #AppleToo…
Asked what Apple was doing to protect its employees from Texas’ abortion restrictions, Mr. Cook said that the company was looking into whether it could aid the legal fight against the new law and that its medical insurance would help pay for Apple workers in Texas if they needed to travel to other states for an abortion.
A common theme is that Apple’s secrecy has created a culture that discourages employees from speaking out about their workplace concerns — not with co-workers, not with the press and not on social media. Complaints about problematic managers or colleagues are frequently dismissed, and workers are afraid to criticize how the company does business, the employees who spoke to The Times said.
“Apple has this culture of secrecy that is toxic,” said Christine Dehus, who worked at Apple for five years and left in August. “On one hand, yes, I understand the secrecy piece is important for product security, to surprise and delight customers. But it bleeds into other areas of the culture where it is prohibitive and damaging.”
MacDailyNews Takeby SteveJack: A fish rots from the head down.
You want to spend years touting privacy only to cave to governments worldwide by building obvious backdoor surveillance into your computers and devices? And try to use the eminently transparent Think of the Children™ ruse as your trojan horse either because you’re desperate to try to hide your betrayal to the company and its loyal users or you think everyone else is stupid, that we don’t see you selling out Apple and Apple users?
Get lost.
Retire.
Take your nauseatingly vast overpayment and your cloyingly sanctimonious twaddle and go pound sand.
After what Steve Jobs built, a chimpanzee could run Apple profitably for many years. (Yes, even Steve Ballmer could do it.) — MacDailyNews, April 10, 2017
Will I shed a tear when Tim Cook finally exits Apple? Take a wild guess.
