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

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

#811

Post by KODeKarnage »

dlp211 wrote: post #791
chubbyish wrote: post #575

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone has laughed at these kinds of jokes. Also, if someone had a funny name and they went against progressive politics, then they would be laughing about it. How about all the Donald Drumpf stuff from Oliver. It puzzles me what progressives actually do laugh at when so much is forbidden and everything is somehow insensitive. Most likely is that they are all just hypocrites.

The difference is punching up versus punching down.

And you just presumed everyone on that list was in the "down" group. Why?

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

#812

Post by smsm42 »

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.

It's not an exclusive option. It is both. You don't have to be "professional" if you're a Supreme King - in fact, you don't need to be anything, the more power you have, the less limitations are placed on you for the sake of others. If you have a lot of power, you can demand from the management to expunge everybody from the company that dares to support wrong political ideas, or demand the management to perform acts of supplication to the right set of political ideas, or turn the profits to causes that you want to be served - instead of causes the management wants to be served. Being able to do that is a power, and we have seen exercise of this power before. Some company leaders are ok with giving a vocal minority of their workers this kind of power, some are not. As a member of a non-vocal minority that does not want my work to serve the power of vocal minority, I would sincerely hope there would be more of the latter.

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

#813

Post by smsm42 »

ipaddr wrote: post #152

Interestingly 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…

I love my job, but if I'd be offered my half-year salary right now to leave, I'd at least seriously think about it. It's a fat chunk of money. I'm not saying I'd take it, but I'd at least spend a couple of days thinking about it.

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

#814

Post by fastball »

blocked_again wrote: post #163
notadoc wrote: post #78

Guessing nearly 1/3 of employees at many companies would leave immediately if offered 6 months salary. Or maybe it's because those people were upset that discussing politics was not part of their job description?

6 months salary is only for long term employees. For rest it's 3 months.

Sure but 46/57 employees count as long-term.

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

#815

Post by [deleted] »

mhneu wrote: post #290
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…

“We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” -Elie Wiesel Choosing to not discuss politics is fine. But if you do that, you’re making a choice: you’re choosing to take the side of those who prefer political decisions to be made by a small elite, without feedback from people like us. You’re choosing not to weigh in.

[deleted]

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

#816

Post by fastball »

w0mbat wrote: post #195

Why has nobody at/leaving Basecamp posted the "Best Names Ever" list so we know what we are talking about? I make up my own mind what is funny and what is offensive.

Probably because that would be a massive violation of privacy, much larger than the original list in the first place.

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

#817

Post by smsm42 »

andkon wrote: post #262
ipaddr wrote: post #152

Interestingly 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…

One of their iOS devs who left has been incredibly vocal about how he no longer felt like this was somewhere he could work because of this policy and its effects, so I think you're plainly wrong (or insisting that there's no way we could take a person at their word). https://twitter.com/georgeclaghorn It's a lot more likely that the 1/3rd that left both left because they were unhappy with the policy, and because they…

> a new job hunt takes 3, even for talented, in-demand people.

That sounds really long. It never took me more than 2 months from an initial contact to an offer (whether accepted or not) and sometimes less. I've seen people hired in less than a month - in fact, I've seen many times people hired before they left the previous job. Of course, it's just my personal anecdata but 3 months sounds really long. Any hard data to back it up?

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

#818

Post by bytelines »

arcturus17 wrote: post #369
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.

This is exactly what I thought, I’d personally find a company with an explicit non-activism policy insanely attractive, all other things being equal.

Did you have a previous experience at a job where that was an issue?

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

#819

Post by guax »

solipsism wrote: post #769
ashtonkem wrote: post #745

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He’s now complaining about cancel culture on Twitter, which is extremely political.

Not defending the founders, they sound like tools. But it's not hypocritical to be political on your personal social media but apolitical at work.

I think is hypocritical to think you can never "be political" at work. Work is where politics are the most prevalent and important in your life, work agreements, rules, benefits, compensation, processes. All political. It seems they're not banning external politics, they're banning internal dissidence.

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

#820

Post by bartread »

skinkestek wrote: post #781
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.

> 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. I'm afraid many of them will be in for a rude awakening. Basecamp has really stood out it seems.

> I'm afraid many of them will be in for a rude awakening.

This is what stood out to me. Basecamp pay 90th percentile Bay Area salaries regardless of where you choose to live. Maybe I'm wrong but I'm not sure that's going to be easy to find without relocating.

Even if you're not a rabid mercenary you're certainly going to feel the impact, if not on your day to day life then on your future plans, of taking a possibly massive pay cut, if you don't want to relocate.

Maybe remote working will become more the norm post-pandemic, and that will put upward pressure on remote salaries, but I don't by any means think that's a foregone conclusion.

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