In the technology industry, “ethical” can be a complicated and difficult quality to pin down in a world where  user data is increasingly scrutinized and often exploited. Incredibly massive and popular companies, such as Apple, Facebook, and Amazon have widely publicized ethical and privacy concerns, yet millions of people continue to utilize their services. Entities like these do not need to find the moral high ground in order to dominate the industry, and they rose to their current status because of aggressive tactics within their companies and against the competition.

This summer in Seattle, I heard lots of industry gossip regarding the reputation of different companies in the area. I spoke to interns at Amazon, and heard about how workers on the Prime floor are willing to work to the point of extreme exhaustion in order to gain a solid wage in an area with an incredibly high cost of living. I discussed the distractions of startup culture or “hip, fun” tech companies with snacks, games, and office spaces to seemingly balance out the fact that workers have long hours and unreasonably high expectations placed on them. Two of my teammates summer had worked at Microsoft for several years – one of them for over 10 years, during the 90s. He told me that if he worked there any longer, it would have killed him.

During the 90s, Microsoft was a bully of the industry, and Bill Gates was the personification of the company’s feared and dominant presence. Gates expected as much of his employees as he expected of himself, even reportedly policing the parking lots on weekends to see who was putting in the most work. I understand that overworking and ethical violations are different, but at this time Microsoft was scrutinized for both. The hostility between Microsoft and Netscape and the landmark antitrust case that followed was later echoed in Mark Zuckerberg’s Senate hearing, which yet again showcased the tension between tech giants and the government.

Microsoft is a unique and prominent example of how a company’s reputation can evolve to become more ethical over time. Their fearless leader, Bill Gates, has changed his pace, his ethos shifting from an aggressive industry leader to an influential and generous philanthropist. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation provides funding and resources to developing countries and communities with the goal of promoting “healthy, productive lives” (Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation). For our generation, this view of Bill Gates seems more prominent than his cutthroat practices in the 90s. Harvard Business School professor David Yoffie notes, “The irony for Microsoft is that they lost in search, they lost in social networks and they lost in mobile, and as a consequence, they have avoided the recent pushback from governments and media…This has given Microsoft the freedom to take the high road as the ethical leader in technology.”

Do you believe that companies and leaders can truly become more ethical over time, or is this merely a change in public perception? Does an unethical or ethically-ambiguous history haunt a company or leader, or prevent them from achieving social progress?

As the field of big data becomes increasingly prominent, and our information is sold and utilized by a variety of entities, we must continue to ask ourselves how ethical leadership touches our lives.

Wingfield, Nick. “Microsoft Tries a New Role: Moral Leader.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 7 May 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/05/07/technology/microsoft-moral-leader.html.