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Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

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Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#81

> Rebuilding Coinbase as an intelligence, with humans around the edge aligning it. Oof. That smacks of hubris and valley-buzzwordism. > Leaders will own much more, with as many as 15+ direct reports. > Every leader at Coinbase must also be a strong and active individual contributor. So, a manager who's managing 15 people AND expected to ship -- that sounds awful for both sides.

> manager who's managing 15 people AND expected to ship

Notable is what they're not doing--annual reviews. This duty is now handled by the all seeing "intelligence" machine that can evaluate employees in real-time.

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#82
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"US employees will receive a minimum of 16 weeks base pay (plus 2 weeks per year worked), their next equity vest, and 6 months of COBRA." 4 months basic severance pay + 1 month for 2 years emploument is nice? so total 5 months severance after 2 years of working for them or only 6 months after 4 years let me guess you are from US if you think this is nice, as European I would say this is fairly standard, nothing to br…

> as European I would say this is fairly standard I must live in a different Europe then. I'd say this would be EXTREMELY generous for Europe.

well, everyone has different experiences, but just to make it clear, I was calculating ordinary salary during notice period into severance pay since in many companies it's essentially severance pay:

1. you get fired with 2 months notice period and they will tell you, you don't need to bother to come anymore = 2 months of severance, you can sit at home, look for job for 2 months with full salary

2. on top of this you will get also extra 2 months severance pay

so in total de facto 4 months of severance pay , but I understand shitty companies will expect you to work even during notice period (especially if they are firing you) and somehow expect you will be delivering same results, smarter companies know the reality when they are firing someone and just tell him not bother coming anymore, this was my case in last 1-2 jobs I've had more than 10 years ago when I was still employee (plus they wanted to give me 1 month severance pay, but I argued about years I worked there and certain operation practices which could be published, so got 2 months, unlike my less assertive colleagues), I'm nowadays contractor/freelance for companies outside Europe so no law protection for me

my wife is always employed as employee and got fired this winter under conditions I mentioned in point 1&2 and got 2+2 months after 1 year of work, two jobs ago she was fired without severance but didnt need to work during notice period

plus I've found funny mention of the 6 months COBRA as some benefit, you are covered by insurance in Europe regardless of your job status whether employed or unemployed you are always covered by universal healthcare

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#83
post #16

Lol “Non-technical teams are now shipping production code” definitely what I want my financial institution doing.

That statement does not inspire confidence considering how ripe crypto is for hackers/scammers, if anything it makes me want to close my Coinbase account.

Closing mine today

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#84
post #24
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"US employees will receive a minimum of 16 weeks base pay (plus 2 weeks per year worked), their next equity vest, and 6 months of COBRA." 4 months basic severance pay + 1 month for 2 years emploument is nice? so total 5 months severance after 2 years of working for them or only 6 months after 4 years let me guess you are from US if you think this is nice, as European I would say this is fairly standard, nothing to br…

As an American, I’d point out that there are structural reasons the U.S. often outpaces Europe in certain areas of innovation and business, tech and otherwise. Labor regulations in many European countries make it harder to reallocate talent quickly, which can slow down company formation and scaling. That doesn’t make one model universally better. There are clear tradeoffs on both sides. But it is part of the equation…

Sure, I agree, not sure why you are downvoted for stating the facts, both have benefits, Europe in general is less flexible but employees are more protected with more benefits.

All I wanted to say was I don't find 4 months something particularly "nice" as European, though I am sure there are even some Europeans who would find it nice since they work for crappy companies in countries with less protection, so they are in lose lose situation, no US benefits (salary/taxes), no Europe benefits (severance pay/notice period).

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#87

> - No pure managers: Every leader at Coinbase must also be a strong and active individual contributor. Managers should be like player-coaches, getting their hands dirty alongside their teams. Geeks who didn't even stand near professional sports should really shut up about anything sport related, lol. I would really like to see professional, established coach running around with young prodigies on a peak of their bio…

> Geeks who didn't even stand near professional sports should really shut up about anything sport related, lol. I would really like to see professional, established coach running around with young prodigies on a peak of their biology.

Player-coach used to be a thing in professional sports a long, long time ago. There's a reason you don't have it anymore. A coach can't be expected to take the long-term view while also expecting to contribute. Most examples were players near the end of their career and they didn't tend to do very well.

The only place you see it is in fun adult leagues. Perhaps the message then is that Coinbase wants to be less professional and more amateur-like?

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#88

> We’ll also be experimenting with reduced pod sizes, including “one person teams” with engineers, designers, and product managers all in one role. Experimenting or cost-cutting? Are these one-person "teams" you g to be paid more for having multi-domain roles regardless of how fast AI can churn out pseudo-MVPs? We're going to see this become a trend beyond Coinbase, IMO. The idea that companies just want employees to…

Seriously. Why is everyone just silently accepting this?

What is the alternative

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#89
post #68

Publicly traded companies get their stock price punished if they just announce layoffs, whereas if they say it is because of AI, they do not see the same treatment. If you look at Coinbase in 2020 they had roughly 1,200 employees. By 2022 they had roughly 4,500 employees. They over hired and now they are pairing back, this is all it is.

They already had substantial layoffs in 2023 for that https://www.coinbase.com/blog/a-message-from-ceo-and-co-foun...

It's because crypto goes in a cycle and now it's down. You should expect layoffs from them again in 2029/30.

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