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Coinbase is a mission focused company
- xoxoy 6y agoI wonder what triggered this blog post - sounds like there must have been some recent internal controversies. But this just sounds like 1) an excuse to fire people and 2) a warning to never talk about politics at work.
- throw_m239339 6y agoPure speculation but I guess the usual stuff that happens in every other Silicon Valley IT company today: Some employee or a group an employees decided they didn't like one of Coinbase's client because of their political affiliation and wanted to kick them out because they think they have a say as to who Coinbase should do business with and who they shouldn't. If it is really the case then, I'm actually surprised Coinbase management had the balls to put out a statement like that, in a era where activists deem "inaction as complicity".
- gwicks56 6y agoThat's the thing about being good at your job in our field though...you essentially do get a say, because we're hard to replace. If you are genuinely good, you can get a new job with a 6 figure income in a matter of days, weeks at most. It will take the company months to replace you, probably 6 at least until the new hire is working even close to your capacity. It wasn't until I started to have to do the hiring that I realized just how hard it was..... finding good tech workers is a long, expensive, time consuming process, and in the end it's still 30% luck whether the hire is going to be both good at the job and a cultural fit.
- throw_m239339 6y ago> because we're hard to replace. Are we? the fact that a CEO has to remind their employees that they are working in a business and this isn't some college campus makes me think we aren't.
- austhrow743 6y ago>probably 6 at least until the new hire is working even close to your capacity If you're focused on the company mission yes. If you're spending your time and energy on other goals, particularly when that involves trying to get other employees to spend their time and energy on other goals, nah the new hire will be beating your capacity on day one just by not being as much of a net negative.
- tgsovlerkhgsel 6y ago> in a era where activists deem "inaction as complicity". My guess is that they realized dealing with the shitstorm once is cheaper (in terms of the damage it does) than dealing with smaller shitstorms constantly.
- wmf 6y agoThe same woke activism as everywhere else. "many employees were interpreting our mission [of creating an open financial system for the world] in different ways. Some people interpreted the mission more broadly, to include all forms of equality and justice. ... Coinbase has had its own challenges here, including employee walkouts." Because cryptocurrency has a lot of non-liberal people of various kinds, the culture war could be hitting Coinbase even harder than other companies.
- xoxoy 6y agocryptocurrency is inherently political. bitcoin was created in part in retaliation against a fiat currency system that continues to be propped up by central bankers i think it would be hard to talk about crypto without constantly talking about regulators, governments, central banks, etc etc etc
- wmf 6y agoAddressed in the article: "If there is a bill introduced around crypto, we may engage here, but we normally wouldn’t engage in policy decisions around healthcare or education for example. ... We don’t engage here when issues are unrelated to our core mission, because we believe impact only comes with focus. We don’t advocate for any particular causes or candidates internally that are unrelated to our mission, because it is a distraction from our mission. Even if we all agree something is a problem, we may not all agree on the solution." Just because something is political doesn't require you to take a stand on every other political issue.
- cblconfederate 6y agoIsnt it clear that it s politically libertarian, or anarcho-capitalist? Still, why does work have to mix with political campaigning?
- SecretRepub 6y agoThis is just a wild guess, but for awhile it seemed like every US company from Doritos to Bank of America was posting corporate social media in support of activist causes. There is a certain strain of thought in the activist community that failing to be an activist is to be complicit with existing oppression. I even saw some companies get pushback for being late/not being enthusiastic enough in their expressions of support, to the point of resignations under pressure. It takes courage to make a statement like this in the current political context. I have found the crypto industry in general to be more open-minded than other subsets of tech
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- ciarannolan 6y ago> But for some employees, working at an activism focused company may be core to what they want, and we want to prompt that conversation with their manager to help them get to a better place. Life is too short to work somewhere that you aren’t excited about, and we’re happy to make that a win-win conversation. > We won’t: > Debate causes or political candidates internally when unrelated to our mission > Expect the company to represent our personal beliefs externally > Assume negative intent, or not have each others back > Take on activism outside of our core mission at work I wish more companies would take this position. I go to work to build great things and work with great people, not to talk about identity or partisan politics.
- jMyles 6y ago> I go to work to build great things and work with great people, not to talk about politics. It's hard for me to imagine any topic of discussion internally at Coinbase that is not political. Often in these situations, defense of a status quo becomes "non-political", while any suggestion that a better method might exist for doing something (especially regarding custody of assets precisely designed to be beyond state control) is "political".
- wmf 6y agoEven if everything is political, some topics don't need to be discussed inside the company at all.
- pfooti 6y agoI'm sure you and others realize this, but it bears repeating: everything is political. If you want to work and not talk about the politics of your work, or the politics of the general world, that's basically signaling that you you are okay with the status quo. This is not necessarily a _bad_ thing, but in this world it is impossible to be apolitical. The only thing you can be is okay with the status quo.
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- jger15 6y agoCommend Armstrong for making this public. A valuable recruiting tool. Imagine other companies will follow suit.
- skybrian 6y agoSome may disagree, but at least that’s clear. For comparison, here is a nonprofit version: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Here_to_build_an_encyclopedia https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Here_to_build_an_e...
- callamdelaney 6y agoNot seen this much fluff in a while - Coinbase is definitely a profit focused company.
- austhrow743 6y agoI exhaled heavily at this part >We are a for-profit business. When we make profit, we can use that to hire more great people, and build even more. Not what for profit means at all.
- bobsmooth 6y agoIsn't expansion the goal of every for-profit business?
- austhrow743 6y ago1. No 2. Plenty of non-profits aim to expand
- bobsmooth 6y agoI'm sorry, I don't understand your derision towards the line you quoted.
- austhrow743 6y agoOnly a for profit organisation can siphon off profit out of the organisation and give it to ownership. Either a for profit organisation or a not for profit organisation can reinvest profit to expand operations. In fact given the inability to do the first item, that's pretty much all not for profits ever choose to do with it. Sure they could maintain level of current service and reduce revenue, but none really choose to. Never seen one with a "no longer taking donations, we're good" page up. So given those two things, it's nonsensical to say >We are a for-profit business. When we make profit, we can use that to hire more great people, and build even more. However it gets even more ridiculous given that neither profit status nor expansion were the core topic of the post. The author didn't need to mention nor try to justify the for profit status of the organisation. So they went out of their way to shoehorn this nonsense line in for no reason.
- HashingtheCode 6y agoCoinbase is on a mission to bend over backwards for the tax man, and willing provide all customer KYC user data and blockchain transactions/details to them. If you want to crypto, if you want privacy don't use Coinbase. You can always use LocalEthereum to buy ETH anonymously and then transfer to a private wallet https://decrypt.co/40685/electronic-frontier-foundation-calls-out-coinbase-on-privacy https://decrypt.co/40685/electronic-frontier-foundation-call...
- alexyz12 6y agoThe ability to have this response seems like a good example of white privilege. Now Coinbase is choosing to exercise this privilege to more efficiently pursue their goals. As a potential employee, would you like to work at a company choses to do this?
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- marcinzm 6y ago>As a potential employee, would you like to work at a company choses to do this? Based on the responses here on hacker news many people would love to work for such a company.
- seibelj 6y agoThe simplest solution to many issues with corporations is to let them focus on what they do best - making money - and not saddle them with tons of additional baggage like - Making business pay for healthcare - Making business take political stances - Making business responsible for caring for the sick / needy / orphans / etc. Let business make maximum money and distribute it to employees and owners, then let everyone who received money deploy it to their favored interest groups / politicians / activisms / social programs / charities / etc. Much less conflict in regards to business - thinking about them, working for them, differing theories about their role in society, etc. Businesses provide value and earn profit for doing so. And for things like healthcare, let government handle it, why we let business pay for healthcare in USA is so absurd. So Coinbase has a good model - stop wasting the whole day getting worked up about political arguments and shaming each other for perceived slights. You can do that after-hours on Twitter and FB as much as you like.
- gogopuppygogo 6y agoWay too logical. Not enough tax loopholes. The real constituency of the USA government (the top 1% of earners / people above $400k/year) will not agree on much except maybe healthcare. Only because they can’t even figure out what care they get for what price anymore.
- seibelj 6y agoThe shareholder theory of corporate governance is under attack. It is the dominant theory for decades now, and I agree with it, and I don't want stakeholder capitalism. I want corporations to make money and let non-profits / government deal with social problems. So much easier and prevents 5000 different opinions at 5000 different corporations for how they should spend shareholder money on activisms ABCXYZ. Give the money to shareholders and let each of them decide. Otherwise you further divide society, with each investor having to invest in "democrat" companies or "republican" companies, etc. Totally unnecessary.
- projektfu 6y agoThe shareholder theory is gone. Management has taken over and run the company for their own benefit, not for shareholders.
- vmception 6y agoI love this! People that need their company to match unrelated causes to them, quit! Go live as a pauper or maintain your subsidized life making room for people that want a job or want to also focus on the laser guided mission!
- trustfundbaby 6y agoI've found it very odd how freely and openly siding with a political candidate has become the norm since 2016 at the tech firms I've worked in. Even more so, has been the viciousness of the pushback when I've asked for such discussions to be funneled into private channels and forums, with the whispers being "oh he must be a trump supporter", which is pretty hilarious if you know me. I think this article is a well articulated viewpoint and I hope that more companies move in this direction. There is a reason why for all those years that it was considered a social faux pas to discuss politics and religion in polite company and especially at work, the potential for division, hurt feelings and retaliation can very easily cause deep irreconcilable schisms in even the most talented workforces. I just hope that this doesn't however transform into something more insidious, a way to muffle very important voices for change with respect to diversity at tech companies, though I have a sinking feeling that it will You win some. you lose some I guess.
- xoxoy 6y agocrypto is inherently political though in the sense that you have to talk about government, central bankers, inflation, fiat currency, etc. when you talk about it. i don’t know how you separate it from politics when it was literally born out of the failures of government to protect us from the global financial crisis.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y agoYou can do what Coinbase does, and focus on the positive benefits cryptocurrency helps people achieve rather than problems in political governance. It'll be unavoidable to occasionally touch on topics which happen to be political, but there's no reason a cryptocurrency company would have to take sides on how the Federal Reserve should be run or whether the financial crisis bailouts were appropriately administered.
- megameter 6y agoThe political element can be cleaned up when the mission is framed as study first. As in, study the options. Study the stakeholders. Study outcomes when implemented and trialed. Study the mechanisms by which outcomes are measured. When you do this the laser focus on the mission stsys near the surface: You can't address all the political elements by building or lobbying from within your team, but you can say "our study shows that..." and thus create the environment for another group to act upon, while not doing every suggested thing yourself because the dependencies needed will take you off mission. It's coherent with the idea of decentralizing decision making.
- terramars 6y agoWow... this much bullshit makes me really glad I never interviewed for them and recently switched to Gemini... Talk about taking corporate censorship to the next level!
- SirensOfTitan 6y agoI find it pretty concerning the tack of political activism corporations take on. Today it’s something you believe in, tomorrow it’s not, and it averages over time to what’s good for business. Trade unions or other examples of worker self management are the way to push these kinds of politics. Not all unions need to be the teamsters run by Jimmy Hoffa, the modern white-collar union would and could hardly represent it.
- xrd 6y agoLong ago, another company chose profit over being forced into making moral assessments. "Indeed, Black demonstrates with great precision that the godlike owner of the corporation, Thomas Watson, was impervious to the moral dimension of his dealings with Hitler's Germany..." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust I have a friend who is a high level Google VP that is very active in advocacy for people less represented at Google and in the world, what I assume people here are referring to as identity politics (I'm VERY interested in hearing if there is a distinction I'm missing). It just occurred to me, maybe he, as a Jewish man, feels like he has seen this kind of thing before, and felt he needed to take a stand. Mr. Miyagi once said: "Walk right side, safe. Walk left side, safe. Walk middle ... sooner or later you get squish like grape."
- 0xy 6y ago>I have a friend who is a high level Google VP that is very active in advocacy for people less represented at Google The same Google that was planning on launching in a country with slave camps for Uyghurs Muslims? To put it bluntly, hiring a few black people does not make up for Project Dragonfly. I guess the VP you're talking about has decided who's where on the diversity chart, according to his approval of Google's behavior.
- xrd 6y agoI'm open to hearing about this. Link? Edit: oh, you are saying in China. Isn't that whataboutism? Maybe I'm doing the same thing?
- 0xy 6y agoMy point is that diversity and inclusion means not supporting such practices, so the VP is either oblivious/ignorant or knows full well of the double standard -- neither reflect well on him.
- xrd 6y agoI'm really interested in understanding how to differentiate between these two things. It seems like Google does permit internal debate, and fires people when their views are too damaging for the culture. I really, really doubt a lot of people had strong opinions about going into China, and lost to other opinions. That seems really healthy at least. Coinbase seems like it is saying: no internal debate permitted on political things, just purely discussed on whether it makes financial sense. To me, Coinbase seems really lazy.
- blhack 6y agoGood. There is a broader philosophical idea being put to work here: your professional life and your personal life should be able to be separated. That goes both ways: let me "leave" work when I'm done, but also ask employees to "leave" their personal lives when they're at work.
- xoxoy 6y agobut they won’t let you leave work when you’re done is the problem.
- tupputuppu 6y agoAnd bringing politics to the office help how?
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- evantahler 6y agoThis is a well articulated way to think about leading a company in a time of crisis... when you can assume the crisis doesn’t effect your company.
- xiphias2 6y ago,,Coinbase’s mission is to create an open financial system for the world.'' I will never forgive Coinbase for pushing so hard for centralizing Bitcoin by increasing the block verification time for nodes. I'm happy though that Bitcoin withstand their attack. So thanks, but no thanks for this message about building a better world.
- MarkMc 6y agoI wonder weather this will make it harder for coinbase to attract minority job candidates.
- amachefe 6y agoWhy do you think minority candidates are want to work in activist places? Many want to do their work and go home and not deal with one cause after the other!
- dmantis 6y agoSo much hypocrisy, so much 'mission'. Coinbase are pioneers of custodial, KYC-first, users data trade and espionage (IRS scandal) approach to crypto which harms ecosystem deeply, making non-custodial solutions more vulnerable to chain analysis and regulations. Coinbase is philosophically a bank, not a crypto provider. And they hired people who put DreadPirateRoperts into jail which say a lot too.
- cromwellian 6y agoNero fiddled while Rome burned, as long as he got paid for busking.