THE NEW CEO ACTIVISTScomments and stating his opposition to Trump’s immigration ban.
But that response did not stop Under Armour’s stock from being
downgraded as one analyst wondered whether the gaffe would
“make it nearly impossible to eff ectively build a cool urban lifestyle
brand in the foreseeable future.”
CEO activism has sometimes led to charges of hypocrisy. For
example, a few conservative websites have criticized Benioff and
Cook for denouncing religious freedom laws while Salesforce and
Apple continue to do business in countries that persecute LGBTQ
individuals. And some activism eff orts have come off as clumsy:
Consider the widespread ridicule that greeted Howard Schultz’s Race
Together campaign, in which Starbucks baristas were instructed to
write that phrase on all drink cups in an eff ort to combat racism.
On the other hand, activism can burnish a corporate leader’s
reputation. In the aftermath of the violence in Charlottesville, the
These results imply that public opinion, at least in this study, was shaped
more by the message than by the messenger. There are two ways to inter-
pret this: You can infer that CEOs have no special ability to infl uence public
opinion. After all, their statements had no more eff ect than politicians’ or
unattributed statements. On the other hand, the results show that CEOs can
be as persuasive as political leaders. CEOs can attract media attention, es-
pecially when they speak out on contentious social and environmental issues
that are not obviously connected to their bottom lines, which heightens their
authenticity. Given that CEOs can sway public opinion, we assume that they
can shape public policy, too.
Our study went a bit further to see whether CEO activism would aff ect people
diff erently depending on their preexisting policy preferences. We found that
Cook’s discrimination remarks further eroded ( already- low) RFRA support
among same- sex marriage advocates but had no impact on the much more pro-
RFRA views of same- sex marriage opponents. It’s important to be aware of whose
opinions CEO activism is likely to shift— and whose are likely to be unmoved. In
fact, recent research has found that CEOs’ political endorsements can signifi -
cantly aff ect the campaign contributions of their employees, which suggests that
CEO activism might be especially infl uential with a CEO’s own employees.