Good morning, Broadsheet readers! Nasdaq's board diversity rule is safe, Google loses a gender pay discrimination suit, and Fortune senior writer Maria Aspan interviews Land O'Lakes CEO Beth Ford on how she decides when to weigh in on policy—not politics. Have a productive Monday.
- Corporate advocacy. It’s an incredibly tricky time for businesses to talk about political or social issues. But Beth Ford, the CEO of $19-billion-in-revenue dairy cooperative Land O’Lakes, is one of the Fortune 500 chief executives trying to thread this needle.
“I talk policy, not politics,” Ford told me earlier this month at the Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit in Laguna Niguel, Calif.
Ford, who became the first openly gay female CEO of a Fortune 500 company when she took over Land O’Lakes in 2018, is No. 26 on this year’s list of the Most Powerful Women in business. She has spent much of her tenure advocating in Washington for various U.S. policy changes, including increased rural access to broadband internet; immigration reform; and more funding for agricultural research.
All of these policies would benefit the farmers and retailers who make up Land O’Lakes’ membership, while also having a wider impact across the nation. So it makes business sense for Ford, who earlier this year joined President Joe Biden’s Export Council, to take an active role in Washington’s policy debates. But as she told me, she picks her battles.
“I focus on the things that are relevant to my business,” she told me. “If I’m not the relevant person holding that conversation based on my business or based on my background, then I’m just one other voice, and there’s already just too much noise.”
The noise—and the very real business risk—is mounting for all CEOs trying to navigate a fraught political climate and the expectations of a wide range of constituencies, including employees and customers, as I reported for Fortune last month. Companies must balance demands that they engage in social issues against the risk of triggering a politicized backlash to stances seen as ideological, like the one Bud Light experienced earlier this year. As Ford advises, sometimes it’s smarter for CEOs to stay quiet.
“My voice isn’t additive at all times in a conversation,” she said. “I am not just careful; I'm targeted in the things that I think are important that I speak to—and they're generally relevant to our business or our members.”
Watch my full interview with Land O’Lakes CEO Beth Ford here, and read my full article on how companies are handling political and social advocacy here.
Maria Aspan
maria.aspan@fortune.com
@mariaaspan
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