--- title: Facebook Will Train Employees to Deal With Political Biases description: The social media network made the announcement after the company was accused of biased by conservatives. canonical: https://time.com/4380635/facebook-employee-training-political-bias/ author: Daniel White article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-06-23T21:34:25.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T08:50:10.105Z article:section: Politics og:title: Facebook Will Train Employees to Deal With Political Biases og:description: The move comes after the site received criticism from conservatives og:url: https://time.com/4380635/facebook-employee-training-political-bias/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt07131432e1b6b61b/6988927c5f570fb47bb20da8/sheryl-sandberg.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3000 og:image:height: 1688 og:image:alt: The MAKERS Conference 2016 - Day 2 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Facebook Will Train Employees to Deal With Political Biases twitter:description: The move comes after the site received criticism from conservatives twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt07131432e1b6b61b/6988927c5f570fb47bb20da8/sheryl-sandberg.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Facebook Will Train Employees to Deal With Political Biases > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, twice a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3/newsletters?i=9cc06145-4ad8-4311-8830-bbc8de9a41fa&cr=time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3-v1) by [Daniel White](https://time.com/author/daniel-white/) ## Daniel White Jun 23, 2016 9:34 PM UTC  Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg speaks on stage at the 2016 MAKERS Conference Day 2 at the Terrenea Resort in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif. on Feb. 2, 2016. Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg speaks on stage at the 2016 MAKERS Conference Day 2 at the Terrenea Resort in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif. on Feb. 2, 2016. Jonathan Leibson—AOL/Getty Images by [Daniel White](https://time.com/author/daniel-white/) ## Daniel White Jun 23, 2016 9:34 PM UTC Facebook employees [will now be trained](http://thehill.com/policy/technology/284576-facebook-will-offer-employees-training-to-combat-political-biases) to confront their own political biases, after the social network [faced accusations](http://time.com/4341169/facebook-mark-zuckerberg-trending-conservatives-glenn-beck/) that employees prevented conservative news items from trending on the site. “We think a lot about diversity at Facebook,” Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s Chief Operating Officer, announced Wednesday, _The Hill_ reports. “And we have a managing-bias class that all of our leaders and a lot of our employees have taken that I was part of helping to create, and we’ve focused on racial bias, age bias, gender bias, national bias, and we’re going to add in a scenario now on political bias.” The addition of political bias training comes after the site faced criticism that the editors of Facebook’s trending topics feature [downplayed news sources and stories popular among conservatives](http://time.com/4326245/facebook-algorithm-politics/). A Facebook spokesman told _The Hill_ that the training is mandatory for all employees. Many Americans [get their news from Facebook](http://time.com/3957778/twitter-facebook-news-sources/), which maintains its neutrality. “We don’t have a point of view, we’re not trying to make you have a point of view,” Sandberg said. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4380635/facebook-employee-training-political-bias/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4380635/facebook-employee-training-political-bias/"},"headline":"Facebook Will Train Employees to Deal With Political Biases","datePublished":"2016-06-23T21:34:25.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T08:50:10.105Z","description":"The move comes after the site received criticism from conservatives","url":"https://time.com/4380635/facebook-employee-training-political-bias/","keywords":["Social Media","Tech","Internet","facebook"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt07131432e1b6b61b/6988927c5f570fb47bb20da8/sheryl-sandberg.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Daniel White","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/daniel-white/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt07131432e1b6b61b/6988927c5f570fb47bb20da8/sheryl-sandberg.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"The MAKERS Conference 2016 - Day 2","caption":"Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg speaks on stage at the 2016 MAKERS Conference Day 2 at the Terrenea Resort in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif. on Feb. 2, 2016.","creditText":"Jonathan Leibson—AOL/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/social-media/","name":"Social Media"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4380635/facebook-employee-training-political-bias/","name":"Facebook Will Train Employees to Deal With Political Biases"}}]}] ```