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

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

#581

Post by [deleted] » Sat, May 01, 2021, 12:34 AM UTC

gregsadetsky wrote: post #121

grumblestumble wrote: post #89

A lot of the conversation from the "no politics at work" crowd here is centered around "these folks were wasting company time and losing productivity protesting this". That entirely misses the point. The loss of productivity around this issue is entirely on the leadership team. They let this fester - they were complicit in allowing this dumb-ass list to be circulated around the company for years, and when it became a…

DHH's blog post: https://world.hey.com/dhh/let-it-all-out-78485e8e See paragraphs below "So I replied:" ...

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

#582

Post by [deleted] » Sat, May 01, 2021, 12:36 AM UTC

grey-area wrote: post #479

I 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…

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

#583

Post by chubbyish » Sat, May 01, 2021, 12:37 AM UTC

mfer wrote: post #159

Another way to look at this is... job openings are coming to Basecamp and people know the culture is a no politics at work place. I bet a lot of people will sign up for that. Enough to fill the openings.

The scary thing is that there are so many companies willing to hire these types of employees leaving basecamp.

Those who have the expectation of talking progressive politics at work and getting what they want or they leave.

I wouldn’t touch any of them.

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

#584

Post by dragonwriter » Sat, May 01, 2021, 12:39 AM UTC

gifnamething wrote: post #580

coldtea wrote: post #331

It's sad that the target for those employees' "political disruption" is Basecamp. One of the arguably nicest companies to work in, which treats employees well, has a sane work/life balance and advocates so, pays well, embraces remote work, gives back to open source (RoR, etc.), and has good products, with no shady anti-consumer practices, that people actually like and pay for (as opposed to somewhere where they sell…

Management took a stance against the employees. Management cancelled their employees, removing their platform to talk about internal politics. Framing this as 'these people' vs Basecamp is ludicrous. It's 1/3 or more of Basecamp vs. Basecamp's management. Important people in important roles, entire teams. They are this company. Or were.

“Basecamp”. Bandcamp is…a different thing.

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

#585

Post by lettergram » Sat, May 01, 2021, 12:40 AM UTC

Good. Can we please stop with politics in the office. We have laws against discrimination, use them if there’s an issue. Otherwise can we work together to build better products (and in turn world)?

I’m so sick of politics in my office and “inclusion” which really just breeds resentment.

I’m sure basecamp discovered what most places discover - working together is better. Anything that divides us should be removed.

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

#586

Post by [deleted] » Sat, May 01, 2021, 12:42 AM UTC

digitaltrees wrote: post #499

grey-area wrote: post #479

I 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.

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

#587

Post by [deleted] » Sat, May 01, 2021, 12:42 AM UTC

koheripbal wrote: post #146

grumblestumble wrote: post #89

A lot of the conversation from the "no politics at work" crowd here is centered around "these folks were wasting company time and losing productivity protesting this". That entirely misses the point. The loss of productivity around this issue is entirely on the leadership team. They let this fester - they were complicit in allowing this dumb-ass list to be circulated around the company for years, and when it became a…

Our experience when we issued our "No Politics / No Religion" policy at work was very positive. The few people who had an issue with it, subsequently quit or were terminated, and many of their co-workers actually thanked us afterwards for it. We didn't have to pay them to leave. One tried to use the company social media accounts to advance her politics, so we fired her, and the other person became frustrated that she…

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

#588

Post by educaysean » Sat, May 01, 2021, 12:42 AM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #579

ethnt wrote: post #523

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, you say that it's one of the nicest companies to work in, but clearly not if 1/3 of their employees are willing to leave over a policy decision. Some of the employees that left had been there for over 15 years — it used to be a good place to work, but this made it untenable for them.

> but this made it untenable for them. I'd say "I've been here too long, let's shop around since IT is a buyers' market, and take advantage of this one-time buyout offer" is a far more probable explanation than "no political discussions at work rule makes this untenable for me"... Without the buyout or in a worse job market, we'd see much closer to 0 "principled" exits...

Difficult as it may be for you to fathom, not everyone is a mercenary driven by money and greed. Many people choose their work based on their values and beliefs. Especially a well known, tight knit company like Basecamp have leadership positions filled with people who live and breathe the product and its users.

Choosing to leave for greener pastures may be an easy decision if you're at an early stage of your career, but there's a reason these extraordinarily talented folks stayed with Basecamp for as long as they have. It's not because they just couldn't get Google to pay them more.

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

#589

Post by grey-area » Sat, May 01, 2021, 12:42 AM UTC

jollybean wrote: post #557

grey-area wrote: post #479

I 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 think this is an unfair representation and you are straw-manning the situation at least somewhat. The company doesn't think that 'name calling' is appropriate, rather, they don't believe that this activity is the beginnings of some kind of 'race war' and object to language such as 'leads to genocide' as hyperbolic. "unhappy that their employees asserted power over them in the workplace," Yes, if your staff are exer…

This is not the appropriate language: it's their company, and their responsibility. It's not a 'personal fiefdom'.

I used the word deliberately. They mistook their relationship with their employees for a feudal one, they have now discovered it was not.

It's unreasonable to believe that excessive fear-mongering such as language regarding 'leads to genocide' should be accepted at face value.

I imagine gentle disagreement with this graphic would have been completely fine and appropriate coming from the manager - it's ok to disagree at work, many people wouldn't want to take part in that sort of discussion (also ok), but it's not ok for minor disagreements like this or a complaint to HR to lead to massive retaliation from management and a major restructure of the company to attempt to shut down any future complaints.

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

#590

Post by gifnamething » Sat, May 01, 2021, 12:43 AM UTC

notJim wrote: post #99

A big part of me wonders if this was the point of this whole exercise. A certain subset of employees are getting too uppity, so you just tell them to fuck off and then show them the door. Theoretically you could fire them, but that might risk lawsuits or even more turmoil. If you have the cash to do this, why not. Basecamp may be getting exactly what they wanted.

>Usage notes

>This term has historically been used in America to describe black people who were considered to be acting above "their place", and is considered by some to have racist connotations when applied to black people and other people of color; sometimes, arrogant or presumptuous, invoking the same idea, are used as codewords for it.[3][4][5]