Basecamp Employees Are Leaving After CEO Bans Politics at Work

On Friday, numerous employees at remote working software company Basecamp announced on social media that they are leaving the company days after its co-founder and CEO announced sweeping changes including banning political talk on work accounts as well as banning all workplace committees. 

"I've left due to the recent policy changes and subsequent public actions by company leadership," one of the employees who left told Motherboard. Motherboard granted them anonymity to speak more candidly about the decision.

Overall, 15 employees so far have tweeted that they are leaving the company today, with some saying they are leaving specifically because of recent policy changes.

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James Glazebrook, who according to Linkedin works in customer support at Basecamp, tweeted that he resigned "due to recent changes and new policies."

People in management roles at the company appear to have been among those who accepted buyouts. Kristin Aardsma, Basecamp's Head of Customer Support, who manages a global support team of 15 according to LinkedIn, announced her resignation on Twitter, for example. 

Reporting in the wake of Basecamp CEO Jason Fried's blog post announcing the changes indicated that they were the culmination of internal struggles that began with the recent formation of a diversity, equity, and inclusion committee that took steps to push the company in a progressive direction. Ultimately, it resulted in Basecamp's C-suite choosing to shut down all internal committees and put decision-making solely in the hands of executives. 

The move seemed to follow the lead of cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, which made similar policy changes last year. Coinbase offered buyouts to employees who disagreed, and some workers took up the offer to leave the company. 

Basecamp's co-founders did not respond to an emailed request for comment.