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If more than a third of your employees think that a single policy change is enough for them to leave, then maybe your policy change is dumb.

by dbt00 5y ago

Trasmatta 5y ago
Yeah, this is my take. I feel like a huge amount of the blowback here is the insensitive way in which it was handled. They announced it all publicly on their blog, meaning most employees heard about it first on Twitter. It could / should have been handled carefully and tactfully first. The resignations feel less less like a result of a mismatch and more like result of a slap in the face from mismanagement.
ldiracdelta 5y ago
Some times the way to make the company happier is to fire all the unhappy people.
- ironmagma 5y ago
  The unhappy people didn’t get that way by virtue of their genetics.
  - luckylion 5y ago
    It doesn't matter how they got unhappy and activist. Unless you want to spend your time making them happy (instead of building products), what matters is to get them out. I'm a firm believer that you can help toxic people become normal (again). But it takes a lot of time and effort that you can't spend otherwise, and you might alienate others over it who don't want to suffer under the (maybe reforming) toxic person. The question is whether you want to help someone, or build products. Basecamp seems to have opted for not turning themselves into a SuperPAC/self-help group.
    - ironmagma 5y ago
      The trouble is, what made a senior group of people unhappy will also make a less senior group of people unhappy as they become more senior. Just like it’s good to be improving yourself personally, even though it takes a bit of effort and you can’t please everyone, so too should companies be trying to improve themselves. This is because there are such things as both a high-functioning company and a low-functioning company, and the difference isn’t that one wants to build product more than the other.
      - luckylion 5y ago
        > This is because there are such things as both a high-functioning company and a low-functioning company, and the difference isn’t that one wants to build product more than the other. I'm not sure about that. In my experience, it's about priorities, and some people find e.g. political activism more important than building products. When they have to decide between "more activism" or "more products", they value activism higher. I don't think it's a junior/senior thing, and not everybody will end up where they feel like they + the company have "grown apart". In this case, from afar, it looks like most in the company (including the founders) where pretty political, but some employees got more radicalized and the founders (who essentially set the company direction) did not. It's a kind of schism, but it's best for everyone involved to let it happen. I find that kind of generous buy-out a very good way to do it. Some have suggested that it's some kind of demonstration of power, but I don't see that: in a power play, they would've fired the problematic employees (and having worked with activist employees, I'm confident that everyone knew who they were), not given them a large bonus for leaving. They've extended the bonus to everyone (which is great as well, you're not rewarding the bad apples, to so speak), and I wouldn't be surprised if some took the offer purely because of the money.
- pydry 5y ago
  Those unhappy people had friends who were probably on the edge. Firing them is a good way to tip them over it.
Hamuko 5y ago
If not outright dumb, it at least seems pretty ill-informed. Surely no one would intentionally craft a policy to nuke a third of the company? Did they do any research into it before announcing it?
mortehu 5y ago
This is confounded by the fact that they were also offered money to leave. I suspect the results would have been different if they paid 6 months of salary to the ones who stayed instead.
- thu2111 5y ago
  Yeah. That's pretty hard for me to understand. Why did they make that offer? Paying people to quit without any kind of bounds on how many may take the offer seems like a crazy business decision. They made a decision. They announced it to their staff. Anyone not on board would have been fired anyway, so where's the need for the payout? IIRC Coinbase made the same offer and it just seems like the kind of weakness that led to their problems in the first place. A company pays employees to do work, not to not do work.
toolz 5y ago
the decision may or may not be dumb, but appealing to the popularity of a decision is never logically sound. There have been incredibly unethical things done throughout history with far more than 1/3 approval.
- weeblewobble 5y ago
  I think it's pretty sound in this case. A policy change that causes 1/3 of your company to resign in protest is definitionally dumb (unless you're a believer in the "I meant to do that" school of thought being suggested elsewhere in this thread).
tshaddox 5y ago
Or you have too many employees and you can’t think of a better way to get rid of people. Either way, it’s not a good look for company leadership.

If more than a third of your employees think that a single policy change is enough for them to leave, then maybe your policy change is dumb.

by dbt00 5y ago

If more than a third of your employees think that a single policy change is enough for them to leave, then maybe your policy change is dumb.

Trasmatta 5y ago

Yeah, this is my take. I feel like a huge amount of the blowback here is the insensitive way in which it was handled. They announced it all publicly on their blog, meaning most employees heard about it first on Twitter. It could / should have been handled carefully and tactfully first. The resignations feel less less like a result of a mismatch and more like result of a slap in the face from mismanagement.

ldiracdelta 5y ago

Some times the way to make the company happier is to fire all the unhappy people.

ironmagma 5y ago
The unhappy people didn’t get that way by virtue of their genetics.
- luckylion 5y ago
  It doesn't matter how they got unhappy and activist. Unless you want to spend your time making them happy (instead of building products), what matters is to get them out. I'm a firm believer that you can help toxic people become normal (again). But it takes a lot of time and effort that you can't spend otherwise, and you might alienate others over it who don't want to suffer under the (maybe reforming) toxic person. The question is whether you want to help someone, or build products. Basecamp seems to have opted for not turning themselves into a SuperPAC/self-help group.
  - ironmagma 5y ago
    The trouble is, what made a senior group of people unhappy will also make a less senior group of people unhappy as they become more senior. Just like it’s good to be improving yourself personally, even though it takes a bit of effort and you can’t please everyone, so too should companies be trying to improve themselves. This is because there are such things as both a high-functioning company and a low-functioning company, and the difference isn’t that one wants to build product more than the other.
    - luckylion 5y ago
      > This is because there are such things as both a high-functioning company and a low-functioning company, and the difference isn’t that one wants to build product more than the other. I'm not sure about that. In my experience, it's about priorities, and some people find e.g. political activism more important than building products. When they have to decide between "more activism" or "more products", they value activism higher. I don't think it's a junior/senior thing, and not everybody will end up where they feel like they + the company have "grown apart". In this case, from afar, it looks like most in the company (including the founders) where pretty political, but some employees got more radicalized and the founders (who essentially set the company direction) did not. It's a kind of schism, but it's best for everyone involved to let it happen. I find that kind of generous buy-out a very good way to do it. Some have suggested that it's some kind of demonstration of power, but I don't see that: in a power play, they would've fired the problematic employees (and having worked with activist employees, I'm confident that everyone knew who they were), not given them a large bonus for leaving. They've extended the bonus to everyone (which is great as well, you're not rewarding the bad apples, to so speak), and I wouldn't be surprised if some took the offer purely because of the money.
pydry 5y ago
Those unhappy people had friends who were probably on the edge. Firing them is a good way to tip them over it.

Hamuko 5y ago

If not outright dumb, it at least seems pretty ill-informed. Surely no one would intentionally craft a policy to nuke a third of the company? Did they do any research into it before announcing it?

mortehu 5y ago

This is confounded by the fact that they were also offered money to leave. I suspect the results would have been different if they paid 6 months of salary to the ones who stayed instead.

thu2111 5y ago
Yeah. That's pretty hard for me to understand. Why did they make that offer? Paying people to quit without any kind of bounds on how many may take the offer seems like a crazy business decision. They made a decision. They announced it to their staff. Anyone not on board would have been fired anyway, so where's the need for the payout? IIRC Coinbase made the same offer and it just seems like the kind of weakness that led to their problems in the first place. A company pays employees to do work, not to not do work.

toolz 5y ago

the decision may or may not be dumb, but appealing to the popularity of a decision is never logically sound. There have been incredibly unethical things done throughout history with far more than 1/3 approval.

weeblewobble 5y ago
I think it's pretty sound in this case. A policy change that causes 1/3 of your company to resign in protest is definitionally dumb (unless you're a believer in the "I meant to do that" school of thought being suggested elsewhere in this thread).

tshaddox 5y ago

Or you have too many employees and you can’t think of a better way to get rid of people. Either way, it’s not a good look for company leadership.