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“About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”

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Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”

#11
post #2

"Changes at Basecamp" : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26944192 ( 4 days ago, 774 comments ). Which is a feel good piece about management philosophy ( a bit back to our roots ) and does not mention layoffs once.

The announcement of buy-out offers came later.

Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”

#12
post #2

"Changes at Basecamp" : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26944192 ( 4 days ago, 774 comments ). Which is a feel good piece about management philosophy ( a bit back to our roots ) and does not mention layoffs once.

If you want more context, this article really breaks down what happened internally. There's a lot more to the story than was presented. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26963708

Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”

#14
post #13

The employees that left probably spent most of their time protesting. The next article will be “Influx of resume’s for talent that prefers to work and be free from the thought police”

30% of the company spent most of their time protesting instead of doing their job?? That speaks pretty poorly of DHH and Jason's business skills, doesn't it? Shouldn't they have noticed this problem earlier?

Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”

#15
post #9
post #3

Isn’t that only 20 people? Edit: as in, this is misleadingly phrased as if it’s a large collective action

*Three* org heads, two lead developers, and seven developers (apparently the entire iOS team) in that group, at least. That's a recruitment/headcount nightmare... I wouldn't be surprised if other employees leave based on crunch and headcount alone.

I left a job because management decided to take on a customer that was going to be a disaster to work with. This could be happening here. If you were the lone iOS dev you would be on call 24/7 until they hired more people. Why not take a paid vacation

Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”

#16
post #12
post #2

"Changes at Basecamp" : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26944192 ( 4 days ago, 774 comments ). Which is a feel good piece about management philosophy ( a bit back to our roots ) and does not mention layoffs once.

If you want more context, this article really breaks down what happened internally. There's a lot more to the story than was presented. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26963708

Thank you.

Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”

#17
post #3

Isn’t that only 20 people? Edit: as in, this is misleadingly phrased as if it’s a large collective action

It is large collective action per the size of the company.

A small company may actually weather this worse than a large company. Basecamp has run lean for years. Some of those big tech companies like Microsoft often weather huge layoffs with no real ill effects. But they often get really bloated when the economy is rocking and then lean out every now and then.

But this is monstrous. I've never seen this many people leave at once.

There is no way this is good for Basecamp.

Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”

#19

If a third of the people were willing to leave the company over a decision, it sounds like there was a real, meaningful mismatch in priorities. Which is fine, but it's for the best for everyone to end that mismatch.

If more than a third of your employees think that a single policy change is enough for them to leave, then maybe your policy change is dumb.
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