Basecamp, Coinbase, and the Impact of Bailing on Equity, Inclusion, and Anti-Racism
Y'all remember a few months back when I told y'all that companies would get tired of talking about being more equitable and actively anti-racist? Y'all remember when I said that a lot of companies would quit frontin' and make it known that they don't care about how racist they are/have been? Well, since last October a plethora of companies have made very public statements about their intent to stop even trying to be actively anti-racist and equitable. Coinbase made its statement in October 2020. Dismantling white supremacy, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, sexism, ableism - many companies are now calling any discussions about dismantling these issues in the workplace "societal and political discourse that has no place at work."
Translation?
Many companies are telling their marginalized employees and especially their employees of color that they need to "get over" the white supremacist work environments they work in and deal with it 'cause we ain't talkin' about it no more. They don't wanna feel uncomfortable anymore so they're doing away with the uncomfortable mirror they're being forced to look into.
Basecamp is the latest company to make a full-on declaration that they don't want to front anymore about caring. You can read the statement at this link. Some "fun" excerpts from their statement:
"Today's social and political waters are especially choppy. Sensitivities are at 11, and every discussion remotely related to politics, advocacy, or society at large quickly spins away from pleasant. You shouldn't have to wonder if staying out of it means you're complicit or wading into it means you're a target. These are difficult enough waters to navigate in life, but significantly more so at work. It's become too much. It's a major distraction. It saps our energy and redirects our dialog towards dark places. It's not healthy, it hasn't served us well. And we're done with it on our company Basecamp account where the work happens. People can take the conversations with willing co-workers to Signal, Whatsapp, or even a personal Basecamp account, but it can't happen where the work happens anymore."
Translation?
The company would rather not stand with their marginalized and melanated employees openly and publicly. Having a stance affects how the founders and the white staff at Basecamp feel about themselves and undercuts making money by any means. Can't have that now, can we?
"For years we've offered a fitness benefit, a wellness allowance, a farmer's market share, and continuing education allowances. They felt good at the time, but we've had a change of heart. It's none of our business what you do outside of work, and it's not Basecamp's place to encourage certain behaviors — regardless of good intention. By providing funds for certain things, we're getting too deep into nudging people's personal, individual choices. So we've ended these benefits, and, as compensation, paid every employee the full cash value of the benefits for this year. In addition, we recently introduced a 10% profit-sharing plan to provide direct compensation that people can spend on whatever they'd like, privately, without company involvement or judgment."
Translation?
Offering employees great benefits like a wellness allowance, access to farmed sustainable produce, and continuing education funds is something they don't want to do anymore. This isn't them feeling like they're meddling in people's personal lives. They just don't want to do it anymore and they don't want to own it. I’m guessing that they got some feedback from staff around these benefits needing to be more inclusive. Instead of adjusting the benefits to be more inclusive and body-positive, they decided to take them all away. That profit-sharing plan is not going to have the same impact as creating and maintaining benefits that support staff and the community economy.
"For nearly all of our 21-year existence, we were proudly committee-free. No big working groups making big decisions, or putting forward formalized groupthink recommendations. No bureaucracy. But recently, a few sprung up. No longer. We're turning things back over to the person (or people) who were distinctly hired to make those decisions. The responsibility for DEI work returns to Andrea, our head of People Ops. The responsibility for negotiating use restrictions and moral quandaries returns to me and David. A long-standing group of managers called "Small Council" will disband — when we need advice or counsel we'll ask individuals with directly relevant experience rather than a pre-defined group at large. Back to basics, back to individual responsibility, back to work."
Translation?
We don't want staff input anymore. On anything. We didn't like what y'all had to say because it didn't align with what we wanted so we're just gonna nip that in the bud.
Side note: HR should not be handling equity and inclusion. Really. Seriously. I'm saying this as an HR person who is also an equity and inclusion consultant and facilitator. Being equitable, inclusive, and anti-racist is literally contradictory to being an HR professional, especially in white supremacist workplace cultures. I've learned over the years that you can't have someone doing both. This is a recipe for no real movement and progress being made on equity, inclusion, and anti-racism. You can’t serve two masters, for lack of a better term.
I'll leave y'all to read the whole shebang, digest it, and come to your own conclusions. I will leave you with some things to ponder, though:
How important is working somewhere where the company and its founders and leaders are trying to dismantle their personal and professional connections to and perpetuation of white supremacy, hate, and oppression?
If it is important to you and you have a job you're not planning to leave anytime soon: what is your company doing around these topics? Anything? Have they just kinda given up since last summer? How does that make you feel?
If it's important to you and you are job hunting: ask all the questions you can during your next job search about the culture of the company you're interviewing with. Read between the lines. If you get even a whiff of anything resembling the stances companies like Basecamp are deciding to take ask yourself how willing you are to work for them knowing that they support oppression and white supremacy over dealing with their discomfort or doing the hard work to dismantle hate.
If it's not important to you: why? Be honest with yourself. Own your "why."
Things like this bailing out of equity, inclusion, and anti-racism work are why we have miles to go before we rest.