Should your business ban political speech?

Most people agree that political issues are one of the few conversational topics it’s best to avoid in the company of acquaintances and coworkers. But considering how much time people spend communicating with colleagues each day, it’s hard to imagine everyone successfully avoiding politics, particularly during a major election year.

Some organizations have tried to ban political speech altogether, with varying degrees of fallout. A less extreme approach is to develop boundaries around the subject. In the long run, this strategy could offer more opportunities for growth than seems possible on the surface. Keep reading to learn how structure, not silence, could help you manage political speech at work.

Why Some Companies Consider Banning Political Speech

The impulse to ban political discussions at work is understandable. Conversations that begin innocently enough can quickly escalate into arguments. Left unchecked, politically-fueled conversations can create tension among teams, stall productivity, and tear down company culture. Extreme cases could even lead to harassment or discrimination.

According to research from SHRM, 20% of HR professionals reported seeing greater political volatility at work in 2022 than they’d experienced even just three years earlier. This same survey found that U.S. workers have also noticed a shift:

• 1 in 5 workers reported experiencing poor treatment due to their political affiliations.
• 45% of workers said they personally experienced political disagreements at work.
• 50% of people who work in-person full time have experienced political disagreements at work, but it’s not exclusive to office workers: 36% of hybrid workers and 39% or remote workers have this experience, too.

Banning politics isn’t an easy or fail-safe response because it’s increasingly hard to determine what speech can be considered “political” and poorly defined guidelines or loose interpretations of political speech may lead to more problems.

Creating boundaries around political speech is necessary, though, to preserve the point of being in a workplace — that is, people are at work to collaborate with colleagues and work toward meeting company goals. Providing guidance on what is and isn’t appropriate can help employees have healthy disagreements without completely derailing anyone’s work day.

How Colleagues Can Learn and Grow From Political Differences

Author, journalist, and entrepreneur Shane Snow believes that when discussing national or local politics at work, “The thing that [becomes] a problem is when those conversations start to erode the important conversations you need to have about work. If our work is not inherently about politics, then talking about politics is fine unless it makes it so we can't work together and talk about the hard things about work.”

Understanding that not every coworker shares the same political outlook is an important starting point. People have different beliefs based on their unique lived experiences. This should be seen as an opportunity for better understanding, not an argument to be won.

Leaders can help teams develop empathy by modeling this behavior in their own interactions. Demonstrating how divergent ideas can come together to create new solutions and better understanding can help teams develop a more empathetic outlook.

Learning to disagree while maintaining mutual respect is rooted in accepting that more than one idea can be correct, for a lot of different reasons. Letting go of the idea of right vs. wrong can open people up to learning why someone thinks differently than they do without feeling as though they’re being forced into agreeing with them.

Relatedly, employees should be encouraged to consider the intention behind their comments, especially when discussing politics. If their goal is to say something inflammatory, unwelcome, or disparaging, then it’s best that they rethink why they feel compelled to respond that way.

Other Ways To Ensure a Supportive Workplace

Outside of modeling and encouraging appropriate behavior, company leaders can take more formal measures to ensure a respectful, professional workplace without imposing a ban on political speech.

An employee Code of Conduct, as well as HR-vetted harassment and discrimination policies, should already be in place and accessible to every employee for reference. These provide clear guidelines for all office behavior, not just political actions or speech. Leaders can further build on this by working with human resources and legal departments to draft a Prohibited Political Activity Policy. (SHRM provides a template for reference.)

Employees should feel comfortable bringing their authentic selves to work. With a few strategic guardrails in place, you can foster a workplace that allows for honest, respectful discussions and different viewpoints without infringing on your employees’ right to feel comfortable and supported at work.