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How Basecamp Blew Up

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Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#101

Post by lancesells »

ashtonkem wrote: post #51

The through line for all of these disasters seems to be a thirst for attention and adulation. Fried and DHH have always been super excited to tell us how to work, but it turns out when a crisis came to their company, they managed to mess it up to an unbelievable degree. Fried was so thirsty for attention that he told us how to manage a crisis like this before he’d even bothered to handle it himself or even tell his o…

It definitely felt like using company policy as content marketing when I found out this was a blog post first. Strange.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#102

Post by jariel »

DiNovi wrote: post #31
eloff wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like what?

like saying white supremacy doesnt exist in the united states

The exec. did not say that.

'White Supremacy' classically means men in Pointy White Hats.

The CRT people now use it to mean 'regular white people' because they, in their regular, day to day actions, uphold oppressive systems i.e. 'White Supremacy'.

The denial is usually of the later, not the former.

Many progressives are now using the denial of the later, to imply denial of the former, as a kind of bad faith rhetorical weapon, which I think is unfair.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#104

Post by intergalplan »

Barrin92 wrote: post #23
Threeve303 wrote: post #13

This story is so strange. First of all, it has been considered unprofessional to talk about politics at work for as long as I can remember. It's odd how you would need a rule implemented about that. Is this just a generational thing? On the other hand, when did racial equality become an inherently political topic? Especially racial equality inside the workplace. This also doesn't mean that the Basecamp founders are r…

>Is this just a generational thing? No, it's a class thing. Among unionised labour work has always been a political battlefield. What's new is that you know have a politically activist group of people within upper middle class white collar jobs who, traditionally were conservative in temperament because they were materially well off. Professionals whose values do not align with their management have figured out that…

Now that is one of the more interesting perspectives on the situation that I've read, out of all these threads. Thanks.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#105

Post by freediver »

neom wrote: post #78

Amazon has over 50,000 results for "change management" in the books category for a reason. If you're curious to get going on this subject so as to not make these mistakes, "HBR's 10 Must Reads on Change Management" is a great resource.

More concretly, "Leading Change - Why Transformation Efforts Fail" by John P. Kotter is _the_ manual on change management (featured in the book).

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#106

Post by pseudalopex »

seattle_spring wrote: post #103

Why is this getting so much attention? When I first saw the dozen or so headlines exclaiming 1/3 of the company quit I assumed it was a huge company. The place only has 60 employees!

The company is well known. The people in charge have written books about how to run companies. Hansson created Rails. Politics at work is a hot topic for HN now.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#107

Post by groby_b »

seattle_spring wrote: post #103

Why is this getting so much attention? When I first saw the dozen or so headlines exclaiming 1/3 of the company quit I assumed it was a huge company. The place only has 60 employees!

Because the founders have positioned themselves as the thought leaders how to manage a company really well. 5 books and counting. Meanwhile, this whole thing was a masterclass on how not to manage a team.

There are few stories that grab attention like hubris & comeuppance.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#108

Post by tomlockwood »

anon7725 wrote: post #58
fallenfromgrace wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has hints of "reverse racism" and tends to dismiss that racism is an issue...and if it is an issue, racism against white people is the actual and bigger issue. That's closer to the camp of "white supremacist" or at the very least, a common defense used by white supremacist. Generally, this would be someone who is, in his position, at the very best, wilfully ignorant. I was not the one dismissed him, nor do I work…

> It has hints of "reverse racism" and tends to dismiss that racism is an issue...and if it is an issue, racism against white people is the actual and bigger issue. That's closer to the camp of "white supremacist" or at the very least, a common defense used by white supremacist. This is the problem with cultural Marxism / “wokeness”. It’s a sanctified, totalizing ideology that admits zero daylight between “100% agree…

I don't know, reading the quote you've included in this comment - it seems a lot less "totalizing" than you're saying, considering the quote itself uses the loose terms "closer to the camp of" or "a common defense used by". There's already nuance and wiggle room there, so, I'm not sure how you're immediately launching into a pretty sanctimonious and totalizing statement that "cultural Marxism" admits zero daylight between extremes.

Could you help me understand why you feel "cultural Marxism" is so, totally, totalizing?

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#109

Post by etchalon »

anon7725 wrote: post #58
fallenfromgrace wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has hints of "reverse racism" and tends to dismiss that racism is an issue...and if it is an issue, racism against white people is the actual and bigger issue. That's closer to the camp of "white supremacist" or at the very least, a common defense used by white supremacist. Generally, this would be someone who is, in his position, at the very best, wilfully ignorant. I was not the one dismissed him, nor do I work…

> It has hints of "reverse racism" and tends to dismiss that racism is an issue...and if it is an issue, racism against white people is the actual and bigger issue. That's closer to the camp of "white supremacist" or at the very least, a common defense used by white supremacist. This is the problem with cultural Marxism / “wokeness”. It’s a sanctified, totalizing ideology that admits zero daylight between “100% agree…

The commenter did none of those things. They simply pointed out that the defense is often used by actual white supremacists.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#110

Post by moduspol »

vore wrote: post #88
throwawaysea wrote: post #43

This author, Casey Newton, seems to be trying to push a narrative that Basecamp damaged itself by banning politics at work. But the anecdotes in here convince me that Basecamp did the right thing. The people involved in this exchange with Singer seem unhinged - demanding that someone declare that white supremacy exists at work? This type of cultish demand-oriented discourse is unacceptable in professional organizatio…

This dismissal of people as "unhinged", "cultish", and "lack of mental balance" at best unsympathetic and at worst callous. As others have pointed out, it's not really possible to compartmentalize yourself from "politics" unless you are represented by the majority and what is and isn't "politically acceptable" at work has always been fluid and changing. The fact that they have chosen these words to describe their fru…

It blows my mind that we're now so far down the list of transgressions that "list of funny sounding names poorly handled by management" is being touted as some egregious sin justifying claims of white supremacy at the company.

It was a bad idea and it wasn't handled well. But geesh.

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