The cryptocurrency platform Coinbase has now shed five percent of its employees over its policies preventing employees from bringing their activist agendas into the workplace.
Brian Armstrong, the company’s CEO, announced that 60 of the 1200 employees of his company had agreed to take an exit package after he directed his employees to separate politics from work.
In a post titled, “A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company,” Armstrong shared an email that he sent to his employees. He said that the company could have done a “better job bringing the Operating Group and managers along on this clarification of our culture so everyone was prepared before it went to a wider group.”
He also said that some more employees were in “conversation” and may also exit the company after their policy about politics was made official.
It is worth noting that Coinbase had lost some of its employees a few months ago when the company refused to declare its stance on the Black Lives Matter movement. Added to that is the new policy to separate politics from work, persuading a greater number of activist employees to quit the company.
Armstrong, talking about the current wave of employees quitting the company over the latest policy, said that minority groups haven’t disproportionately quit their positions when compared to other communities. “It was reassuring to see that people from under-represented groups at Coinbase have not taken the exit package in numbers disproportionate to the overall population.”
Answering several questions about the company and its approach towards politics, Armstrong said that he wouldn’t mind being political about anything related to crypto, considering it’s related to their “mission” and inherently political.
He said that he trusts his employees to display their judgement and steer clear of politics. “We recognise it’s a blurry line and ask that employees use good judgement. Our goal is not to look for violations, but rather to support employees in adapting to these clarified expectations.”
Coinbase, on the whole, doesn’t see parting ways with a significant number of employees as a bad thing. Armstrong says that the company will be “more aligned.”
