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Coinbase Announces 18% Layoffs

blog.coinbase.com

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Re: Coinbase Announces 18% Layoffs

#491

Post by jjulius »

caminante wrote: post #349
andyjohnson0 wrote: post #293

What struck me about this announcement was that the CEO states a couple of times that he is accountable for the decision, but doesn't say what form that accountability takes. I try not to be cynical, but I suspect in this case that there will be no actual, real accountability.

What do you have in mind for "real accountability?" He could've deflected responsibility or hid behind a proxy, which happens all the time. Now, he gets more judgment good/bad directed at him from shareholders, the board, and customers.

Now, far be it from me to claim that there wasn't bloat in their workforce that generally needed to go, but if money is an issue, I'm pretty sure the CEO could use a house that costs a lot less than $133 million.

Re: Coinbase Announces 18% Layoffs

#492

Post by rockostrich »

UncleMeat wrote: post #208
NikolaNovak wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately it's common enough. It's harsh, it's cold, but ultimately for companies it's a real necessity. The explanation is blunt and correct - even a single malicious actor can enact HUGE devastating harm. It doesn't have to be hot wallet / cold storage. Source code, business plans, revenue & profit statements, SSH to servers, physical access to datacentre, client contact lists, etc etc... there's a myriad thing…

> Friendly, smiley, fake. My father had to lay off a bunch of people in 2008. I am now a manager. He told me that if I am ever forced to do this to not ever do this crap to my team. Tell them that this is bullshit. Tell them that you are upset. Tell them that you haven't slept. Tell them that the are right to be mad, disappointed, and even to hate you for choosing their head to roll. Anything better than fake smiles…

I was a fairly junior manager at the beginning of COVID when my company decided to make a deep cut (20% of the company) in order to make sure we would survive. I didn't even know about the layoffs until after they happened which annoyed me quite a bit. The director of engineering for my team and 3-4 others was the one to do the calls to each laid off engineer. The 2 engineers that got laid off on my team were pretty recent hires. One was only around for a couple of weeks. They were both already contributing a good amount to the team though which annoyed me even more that my input wasn't taking into account because I would've pushed for different people to be let go instead.

I offered to try and give up some salary to keep one of them because he was on a visa and would have to find a new job within 90 days or something like that. Everything worked out in the end with both engineers that were let go but the "bias for action" by executives and middle management in these kinds of scenarios pisses me off quite a bit since they usually don't ask for any input from the people actually working with the employees that are getting laid off.

Re: Coinbase Announces 18% Layoffs

#493

Post by kolbe »

UncleMeat wrote: post #231
vishnugupta wrote: post #107

Compare and contrast CB’s hiring with that of FTX[1] Coinbase “ We have now exceeded the limit of how many new employees we can integrate while growing our productivity. For the past few months, adding new employees has made us less efficient, not more. We have seen ourselves slow down considerably due to coordination headwinds, and difficulty fully integrating new team members.” FTX “ It’s a race–between how quickly…

The FTX quote applies in so many circumstances. Tons of companies, organizations, and even teams have boom/bust hiring. No headcount for ages and then BOOM suddenly piles of headcount. This makes culture and knowledge sharing almost impossible.

FTX is interested in being a real business. I think a lot of people the past several years have failed to try to become a real sustainable business, and instead have been pawns in Benchmark's and Tiger Global's schemes to flip companies into the S&P or into a F500 acquisition. CEOs in the former build responsibly. CEOs in the latter build fast to scare the incumbents into an acquisition or co-investment to push the price high enough to get it into the S&P.

Re: Coinbase Announces 18% Layoffs

#494

Post by bbno4 »

CydeWeys wrote: post #333
timmg wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those charts look way less dire than I would have expected. June isn't halfway through yet. So I'm not sure what to think of that. But prior to June, they had been doing ~$200M in "fees" monthly -- fairly consistently, for almost a year. That's more of a "business" (and more stable) than I would have guessed.

Most of those $200M in fees are Ethereum gas fees that are being burnt on-chain. Those aren't income for OpenSea, they're costs incurred by all parties as part of doing business.

I do not think they are gas fees, that wouldn't make sense. The description on that chart states: > Combined OpenSea and seller fees

Opensea takes a % fee, and the seller takes a % fee. Can you prove it's also including gas fees?

Re: Coinbase Announces 18% Layoffs

#495

Post by NikolaNovak »

mbg721 wrote: post #375
ghaff wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>In many jurisdictions (not in the US I suppose), before firing someone for poor performance they must be told that their performance is inadequate and be given a chance to improve. Performance Improvement Plans are a thing at larger companies. That said, once someone is on a PIP, the handwriting is almost certainly on the wall. I've also worked with people who were incredibly oblivious about the quality of their wor…

The PIP thing varies. Some companies just use them as a risk reducing tool to fire people, but a few really believe in them and will keep employees who've gone through them. I take a dim view of that, personally, just because it ends up feeling like management-by-fear.

It doesn't have to. At its best, PIP is a very open, transparent, communicative, supportive method - here is what we need; here's how we believe you can help us; let's work together to meet our mutual targets.

As others have said, in a good company and team, PIP is one amongst many coaching tools, rarely the first one, and can be useful in various situations - somebody not taking a hint or being oblivious, indicator of seriousness, but also to those with potential who need structure and benefit from explicit list. And yes of course, a paper trail and a documented process if things don't work out for various reasons.

Re: Coinbase Announces 18% Layoffs

#496

Post by andyjohnson0 »

q1w2 wrote: post #468
andyjohnson0 wrote: post #293

What struck me about this announcement was that the CEO states a couple of times that he is accountable for the decision, but doesn't say what form that accountability takes. I try not to be cynical, but I suspect in this case that there will be no actual, real accountability.

His accountability comes in the form of the drop in price of the shares of the company. That is the ultimate accountability for any CEO or other shareholder.

His net worth was about $2.4 billion. Coinbase is currently down ~3.5% on the day. So his net worth is now about £2.3 billion†. I don't see that inconveniencing him much.

† Or maybe a bit more if he was foolish enough to hold some of it in crypto.

Re: Coinbase Announces 18% Layoffs

#497

Post by NikolaNovak »

rootusrootus wrote: post #381
ghaff wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>In many jurisdictions (not in the US I suppose), before firing someone for poor performance they must be told that their performance is inadequate and be given a chance to improve. Performance Improvement Plans are a thing at larger companies. That said, once someone is on a PIP, the handwriting is almost certainly on the wall. I've also worked with people who were incredibly oblivious about the quality of their wor…

> once someone is on a PIP, the handwriting is almost certainly on the wall. My current manager is particularly transparent about this (with other managers, at least). When he puts someone on a PIP, it is a formality. He deliberately chooses a redemption project that is impossible to achieve. Edit: Jeez, guys, don't downvote -me- ;-). It's not my policy.

Ouch. That is unfortunate on several levels. From legal to moral to practical.

Depending on the company, that could easily be appealed/disputed.

Re: Coinbase Announces 18% Layoffs

#498

Post by unholythree »

Barrera wrote: post #60

> If you are affected, you will receive this notification in your personal email, because we made the decision to cut access to Coinbase systems for affected employees. I realize that removal of access will feel sudden and unexpected, and this is not the experience I wanted for you. Given the number of employees who have access to sensitive customer information, it was unfortunately the only practical choice, to ensu…

Places where employees have physical keys face a similar problem; what to do to keep an employee that was fired or quit from having access to things of value they shouldn't be able to access anymore. This is a big part of why key fobs are so popular since you can have thousands of unique ones to enable or disable.

I worked at hotel once where I had keys to everything and I would take them home nightly at the end of my shift. When the hotel changed ownership one of the changes implemented was anyone with hotel keys had to lock them up in one of the front desk safety deposit boxes when their shift ended. At the time I thought this was pointless security theater that wasted 10 minutes of my day. In retrospect, it was probably so we could safely be fired if necessary with our keys still accounted for.

Re: Coinbase Announces 18% Layoffs

#499

Post by pc86 »

rockostrich wrote: post #492
UncleMeat wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Friendly, smiley, fake. My father had to lay off a bunch of people in 2008. I am now a manager. He told me that if I am ever forced to do this to not ever do this crap to my team. Tell them that this is bullshit. Tell them that you are upset. Tell them that you haven't slept. Tell them that the are right to be mad, disappointed, and even to hate you for choosing their head to roll. Anything better than fake smiles…

I was a fairly junior manager at the beginning of COVID when my company decided to make a deep cut (20% of the company) in order to make sure we would survive. I didn't even know about the layoffs until after they happened which annoyed me quite a bit. The director of engineering for my team and 3-4 others was the one to do the calls to each laid off engineer. The 2 engineers that got laid off on my team were pretty…

I don't mean any offense by this but it's very clear by this sentiment that you're a junior, (maybe) mid-level still.

For myriad reasons, it's not always practical to discuss potential layoffs. It's certainly not ethical to discuss "who should stay?" with more junior folks on the same team who are themselves staying. It's extraordinarily likely that your managers had much better insight into what the other folks were contributing that you did.

Cutting salaries to maintain team size has been tried time and time again, and every time the same thing happens: everyone takes a pay cut, the highest performers leave for more money, and both velocity and morale tank.

Re: Coinbase Announces 18% Layoffs

#500

Post by whoknew1122 »

UncleMeat wrote: post #208
NikolaNovak wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately it's common enough. It's harsh, it's cold, but ultimately for companies it's a real necessity. The explanation is blunt and correct - even a single malicious actor can enact HUGE devastating harm. It doesn't have to be hot wallet / cold storage. Source code, business plans, revenue & profit statements, SSH to servers, physical access to datacentre, client contact lists, etc etc... there's a myriad thing…

> Friendly, smiley, fake. My father had to lay off a bunch of people in 2008. I am now a manager. He told me that if I am ever forced to do this to not ever do this crap to my team. Tell them that this is bullshit. Tell them that you are upset. Tell them that you haven't slept. Tell them that the are right to be mad, disappointed, and even to hate you for choosing their head to roll. Anything better than fake smiles…

I agree with your father's sentiments except for 'I haven't slept.' If you have to layoff people, don't make it about yourself. If I'm the person getting laid off, I don't give a damn how much sleep you've had. You still have job.

Talking about how the layoffs affect you, the still-employed manager, makes any thing else you say sound hollow.

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