I think im going to try Basecamp now.
“About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”
731–740 of 1001 posts
Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”
#732Earlier 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.
It’s possible to ban flame wars instead of politics. Dealing with differences of opinions (or lack thereof of this skill) is what causes flame wars. Politics is not the only thing people disagree on. Should they also ban discussion of potentially contentious improvements to the codebase? Edit: reading some of the comments below, it does also say they banned discussion of certain past decisions. It’s not just politics…
[deleted]
Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”
#733Interestingly 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…
Worth adding that the eng team has an even higher rate of departures. Cross-referencing basecamp.com/humans.txt with the list of people who left shows that nearly 2/3 of the Engineering team left, bring them from 15 to 6 (including DHH).
That can't bode well for the company.
Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”
#734Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you think people in charge of hiring, particularly outside of the SV bubble, are going to be eager to pick someone up who left their last job because they couldn't agree to stop bitching about politics on the company dime? I don't see how demonstrating the inability to follow basic company rules in the interest of productivity improves their career prospects. Even inside the SV bubble, things aren't that warped, a…
> Do you think people in charge of hiring, particularly outside of the SV bubble, are going to be eager to pick someone up who left their last job because they couldn't agree to stop bitching about politics on the company dime? I think that's a big mischaracterization of what happened. For one, it seems a lot of the issue was about the 'funny names list' and heated debate around that. It wasn't people going to war ov…
I think that's a big mischaracterization of what happened.
But is it the characterization that other company HR teams / managers will believe?
Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”
#735What 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…
Can't agree more with this.
As I commented in other thread, here in europe this is very uncommon. Here we go to work, to work. Football and politics don't lead to good ends anywhere.
So, join any company outside to the US if you want to focus on work
Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”
#736I don't think this is really about making fun of people's names, or holocaust references. It's about power. The managers at basecamp were unhappy that their employees asserted power over them in the workplace, and decided to assert their own power in turn over what they view as their personal fiefdom and retract some of the freedoms they had so graciously granted their workers, because those ungrateful workers actual…
The managers at basecamp discovered that their employees formed an inquisition that was whipping itself into frenzy looking for the heretics to burn at the first opportunity found.
Unfortunately when lancing that boil they also lost some people who decided that 6 months pay at the hottest market in years is too good to pass up.
Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”
#737What 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…
> 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. [...] The workplace is one of the few places where they can feel like they’re having an impact, but that’s not really appropriate.
Politics is how groups of humans decide the distribution of power between themselves. It should be completely unsurprising that there is corporate politics around what power employees have within a company. Your claim that it isn't appropriate for employees to engage in corporate politics is a deeply political statement and just means that you think all the power within a company should be wielded by someone else. You are entitled to that position just as others are allowed to engage in collective action (also just politics) to achieve a different distribution of power.
I'd also add that it is weird how we live in a society where everyone acknowledges corporations have significant power over our government, yet people seem to be surprised that individuals working for them want a say in how those corporations operate (which would by extension grant influence over the government).
Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”
#738As an European. I don't get this. So, employees create a list for making fun of people. Employees start to fight each other because they take offense. Company states at work, you're supposed to work, not to discuss politics. Th bad actor is the company so we all leave. (??!!!) Honestly, I don't get it. I think it is a cultural thing in the US, due to the long term racism issues ,etc. And how extremely easy is for Ame…
You missed a midpoint here, when employees stated that the list could be racist towards people with Asian heritage, the cofounder doubled down on it, claimed that only 10% could be, and well actuallyed it all and then shut down any communication or talk about it. It was crappy management that didn't listen to problems
Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”
#739I don't think this is really about making fun of people's names, or holocaust references. It's about power. The managers at basecamp were unhappy that their employees asserted power over them in the workplace, and decided to assert their own power in turn over what they view as their personal fiefdom and retract some of the freedoms they had so graciously granted their workers, because those ungrateful workers actual…
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.
It's only a flame war if there is a war. Management should be on the same page as any DEI initiative, especially considering who management is in this case.
Re: “About one-third of Basecamp employees accepted buyouts today”
#740It sounds like working there has become a distraction to working there, which means that working there has become fratcally stupid. Quitting sounds like a reasonable position to take.