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

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

#701

Post by 8note » Sat, May 01, 2021, 2:35 AM UTC

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…

Doing any work fundamentally pushes some political view. Mostly today it's neoliberalism in some form.

I think an obvious alternative is to expect employees to actually support neoliberalism as a job qualification.

Same as if you were working for an evangelical church, you'd expect people to try and convert everyone to Christianity

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

#702

Post by fighterpilot » Sat, May 01, 2021, 2:35 AM UTC

grey-area wrote: post #530

digitaltrees wrote: post #499

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. It’s about professionalism. Flame wars at work create a hostile environment where quiet voices are silenced. It’s the same reason HN bans political flame wars.

I think most would agree more professionalism would be nice, in fact getting rid of a list of funny customer names (as employees suggested) would be more professional, not less. But again, that's not really what the core disagreement is here - that's not IMO why people are quitting - it sounds like most of the company agrees that is a good idea. They are quitting because the founders decided to assert their power nak…

I don't think we know why these people resigned, since the severance package was so generous that many of them may have just taken the excuse for a long holiday.

I would count myself as someone who would simultaneously be thrilled with management's decision to ban political discussion at work but also quit to get the six months pay.

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

#703

Post by 8note » Sat, May 01, 2021, 2:37 AM UTC

gkop wrote: post #638

christophilus wrote: post #515

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I see a Jehovah’s Witness coming up to my door, I pretend to not be home. I’d really hate to be forced to have that same feeling at work, but be unable to escape it. If you can’t do your job without evangelizing your coworkers in some form or fashion, maybe you should reconsider your career choices.

Please don't equate human rights activism to a religious movement.

I'd lean that they are equivalent. Both are all about espousing what the right way to be a human is, and more specifically have strong opinions about the wrong way to be a human

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

#704

Post by 8note » Sat, May 01, 2021, 2:39 AM UTC

christophilus wrote: post #515

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…

When I see a Jehovah’s Witness coming up to my door, I pretend to not be home. I’d really hate to be forced to have that same feeling at work, but be unable to escape it. If you can’t do your job without evangelizing your coworkers in some form or fashion, maybe you should reconsider your career choices.

What are the other options for people to push political opinions nowadays? Corporations are the power brokers today

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

#705

Post by kingsuper20 » Sat, May 01, 2021, 2:41 AM UTC

sircastor wrote: post #427

JauntTrooper wrote: post #28

They offered a severance of 6 months salary if you've worked there for 3+ years... I would be tempted by that offer regardless of any other circumstances, especially in today's competitive jobs market.

Four words come to my mind: “United States Healthcare System” Even with an amazing buyout like this, I feel like you have to be in that relatively narrow space of “no spouse, no kids, good health, pretty young” to be able to walk away from health insurance.

It looks like California ACA Silver plans run about $1000/month for a 30 year old couple.

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

#706

Post by monkeywork » Sat, May 01, 2021, 2:42 AM UTC

It should be made known that "about one-third" of basecamp employees would be what 15-16 or so?

It's not difficult to imagine that you'd have a handful of people who felt politically / socially strong enough to take the buyout for their stated reason and another handful that saw 6 months of pay and a high demand job market and went for it as well.

1/3 sounds like a big deal if you are thinking basecamp is a massive company but in reality they are less than 60 people last time I checked.

If I have a company with 2 other people and one of us leaves due to some sort of dispute, that's also a 1/3 but has a very different feel than if a 1000 head count shop loses 333 people.

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

#707

Post by throwarayes » Sat, May 01, 2021, 2:43 AM UTC

Intimate access to top leadership seems commendable in small in person companies. But the types of skills you have paling around the office like you’re “one of the team” are different than those when you’re faced with essentially a PR crisis. Your every word, especially when written, will be scrutinized. It’s not time to just craft your own feelings into a message. DHH seems like he would have been best suited to not be so authentic with his true feelings and consulted some professionals here instead of taking it into his own hands...

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

#708

Post by faitswulff » Sat, May 01, 2021, 2:44 AM UTC

monkeywork wrote: post #706

It should be made known that "about one-third" of basecamp employees would be what 15-16 or so? It's not difficult to imagine that you'd have a handful of people who felt politically / socially strong enough to take the buyout for their stated reason and another handful that saw 6 months of pay and a high demand job market and went for it as well. 1/3 sounds like a big deal if you are thinking basecamp is a massive c…

They lost the entire iOS development team, among others.

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

#709

Post by StanislavPetrov » Sat, May 01, 2021, 2:46 AM UTC

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #237

ipaddr wrote: post #152

Interestingly the employees who left have the best career prospects. Entire iOS team, head of marketing and head of product team. The 6 months free money is hard for anyone entering a strong job market to pass up. A lot of comments seem to think 1/3 left because of the no politics policy. 1 / 3 left because it would increase their wealth or give them the summer covid took away last year. How many people would leave y…

> The 6 months free money is hard for anyone entering a strong job market to pass up. Surely some of the employees left for ideological reasons, but 6 months of salary just for changing jobs is a difficult incentive to ignore. Anyone who was considering changing jobs would have a hard time saying no to 6 months of free pay. The publicity of this situation also makes them attractive targets for other companies looking…

At least half the people I know would immediately give up their job for no other reason than 6 months of salary.

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

#710

Post by rodgerd » Sat, May 01, 2021, 2:47 AM UTC

spion wrote: post #536

klelatti wrote: post #501

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Treating people right is fundamental to how we do business. We treat our customers as we’d want to be treated, we treat each other like family ... [1] Absolutely spot on. I think they had an implicit contract with their team which they broke in a fundamental way. Notable that DHH's twitter hasn't seen any expression of regret or thanks to the people who have worked hard to build Basecamp and now feel they have to g…

DHH is incapable of expressing regret in general.

It only took him a decade to acknowledge that calling for porn in business presentations was a bad idea, so perhaps he'll have changed his opinion in the 2030s.