“About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today” • Hacker News Board

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

#281

Post by eropple » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:13 PM UTC

grumblestumble wrote: post #219

corey_moncure wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someday you will look back on a world where it was okay to laugh at things, and perhaps you will even remember writing this comment.

I'm generally perceived as a pretty funny guy, I joke around with both my reports and those I report to, and, yes, even with customers all the time. I've found that I don't need to diminish others to do this, there's plenty of other crap to joke about, like the quality of our products, how long it takes to get stuff done, the UX of the tools we share, dumb programming trends. It's easy to laugh without it being at th…

I'm glad that you wrote this, because "punch up, stupid" is just not that difficult a concept in humor.

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

#282

Post by prh8 » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:13 PM UTC

notJim wrote: post #99

A big part of me wonders if this was the point of this whole exercise. A certain subset of employees are getting too uppity, so you just tell them to fuck off and then show them the door. Theoretically you could fire them, but that might risk lawsuits or even more turmoil. If you have the cash to do this, why not. Basecamp may be getting exactly what they wanted.

They're not losing the bottom third of employees, no company ever wants this.

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

#283

Post by newsclues » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:13 PM UTC

intergalplan wrote: post #169

newsclues wrote: post #133

Funny names?

Make friends with anyone who deals with lots and lots of people across socio-economic status boundaries—teachers, social workers, anyone in government who deals with the public on a regular basis—and they can tell you what that means. You'll think they made some of them up, but they didn't. And that's without going international.

I worked in a call centre for telcos and Apple doing tech support.

We didn’t have lists but funny names and stupid customers were frequent topics of discussion

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

#284

Post by scarface74 » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:14 PM UTC

mcintyre1994 wrote: post #263

scarface74 wrote: post #217

Why would I want to talk about politics at work that don’t affect my job and what would it change? Why would I bring up BLM and how it relates to the justice system at work if my company can’t do anything about it? On the other hand, I would be more than happy to discuss having recruitment drives at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, expanding the hiring pipeline, equal pay at my company for equal work, ex…

My understanding of their new policy is that it bans everything you said you’d be happy to discuss FWIW. All of that sounds like political/societal discussion.

If I am working for BaseCamp, there is a difference in my mind about a mailing list discussing Hobby Lobby’s health care policies with regard to birth control and discussing BaseCamp’s policy toward birth control.

I would quit if I as an employee can’t discuss my own company’s policies that affect me as an individual.

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

#285

Post by koolba » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:14 PM UTC

Graffur wrote: post #92

grumblestumble wrote: post #89

A lot of the conversation from the "no politics at work" crowd here is centered around "these folks were wasting company time and losing productivity protesting this". That entirely misses the point. The loss of productivity around this issue is entirely on the leadership team. They let this fester - they were complicit in allowing this dumb-ass list to be circulated around the company for years, and when it became a…

Is Bigbuttson an actual name? That is funny to an English speaker.

If his first name was Bigsby I’d probably be laughing too. Though I doubt I’d put that in writing, in particular in anything remotely corporate related.

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

#286

Post by Decker87 » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:14 PM UTC

tashoecraft wrote: post #241

The problem with no religion and no politics is that it’s impossible to draw a line on what is politics or religion. Let’s say you hire a gay employee, there very existence is political. Are they wrong for mentioning that they are gay (no), but to some at the company that may be trying to advance their gay political agenda. Idk what the solution is, but just blanket “No religion/no politics” is just a way to say you…

How is someone existing a political issue?

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

#287

Post by ryandrake » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:15 PM UTC

mark_l_watson wrote: post #105

I have a different take on this, different than most comments here: I think that the founders/owners knew what they were doing based on reading their book and lightly following them. I have never been a customer. I know that I am just guessing, but they might have been making the lifestyle decision that they wanted a smaller and more focused company that was more joyful to manage/run. Also, I have some sympathy for a…

You're never going to make a policy work that's goal is to "not make anyone uncomfortable". Politics aside, if you have an employee who is uncomfortable when it's warmer than 60F sharing an office with another employee who is uncomfortable when it's colder than 70F, bam, your HVAC policy is unworkable.

Back to opinions: There is a very wide range of topics that might be uncomfortable to any one person. You'd need to avoid the union set of all of those topics--which might mean you can say nothing at all!

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

#288

Post by pnutjam » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:15 PM UTC

Baeocystin wrote: post #267

tashoecraft wrote: post #241

The problem with no religion and no politics is that it’s impossible to draw a line on what is politics or religion. Let’s say you hire a gay employee, there very existence is political. Are they wrong for mentioning that they are gay (no), but to some at the company that may be trying to advance their gay political agenda. Idk what the solution is, but just blanket “No religion/no politics” is just a way to say you…

It genuinely isn't difficult in practice. Be polite and professional to your co-workers. That's it. If someone is gay, straight, whatever, it doesn't have any bearing on their work, so it's not something that's discussed. I have literally zero desire to hear about anybody's sexual relationships at work. If someone thinks that the mere presence of a gay person is an agenda, then they fail rule 1, which is be polite an…

You're advocating for a middle ground that doesn't exist.

As a racially ambiguous guy, most people are professional, but I pick up occasional comments and the way people act when you try to show them a better way or correct them really shines a light on this issue.

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

#289

Post by xbar » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:15 PM UTC

Ar-Curunir wrote: post #216

baron816 wrote: post #181

What I think is lost in the conversation here is that people don’t really have organizations they can go to to advocate their political positions. People have their families, their jobs, and maybe a couple of friends and that’s about it. They need an outlet to push the ideas and causes they care about. The workplace is one of the few places where they can feel like they’re having an impact, but that’s not really appr…

"Workplace is inappropriate for politics" is a really ahistorical stance to take. All the things that you enjoy nowadays (8 hr work day, 5 day work week, no child labour, etc) came about as a result of organized politics at the workplace.

Nope. Those are all the results of laws which came from politically elected officials who made policy.

None of my employers limited work hours or work days or children at work because of political discourse in the office. Nor did historical companies from 3 generations ago when such laws were passed.

All of those laws were created because companies did NOT implement such limits.

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

#290

Post by mhneu » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:15 PM UTC

grumblestumble wrote: post #89

A lot of the conversation from the "no politics at work" crowd here is centered around "these folks were wasting company time and losing productivity protesting this". That entirely misses the point. The loss of productivity around this issue is entirely on the leadership team. They let this fester - they were complicit in allowing this dumb-ass list to be circulated around the company for years, and when it became a…

“We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” -Elie Wiesel

Choosing to not discuss politics is fine. But if you do that, you’re making a choice: you’re choosing to take the side of those who prefer political decisions to be made by a small elite, without feedback from people like us. You’re choosing not to weigh in.