
How to run a calm workplace: review of Basecamp's book - martincmartin
https://www.economist.com/business/2018/10/06/how-to-run-a-calm-workplace
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ppeetteerr
I read the book and I enjoyed it. It still feels like a recruitment tool for
Basecamp in the same way all "self help" books just seem to describe what the
author does well, rather than how to deal own with personal difficulties. If
you happen to have a company like theirs (<100 employees, ability to work
remotely, profitable), this book will help better align your team's efforts
and create a good work environment. If you work at a startup or for IBM, this
might do more to depress you...

~~~
kbuchanan
It's useful to step back and realize that some of the things Basecamp
advocates are privileges, not strategies.

In other words, they've been blessed with enough success that they can choose
the path they're on. OF COURSE there's a feedback loop—remote work helps them
be more successful, without a doubt. But, the trade-offs Basecamp makes are
not always available to other businesses, and do not offer the same clear
upsides to either employees or owners.

(Having said this, I'm a big fan of their style and have learned a lot from
them...)

~~~
coldtea
> _But, the trade-offs Basecamp makes are not always available to other
> businesses_

Shouldn't we build an environment where they are?

E.g. if a company doesn't use slave or child labor today, or doesn't pay in
company scrip, it's not a loss for them, because no company can use those
either. Unpaid overtime was similarly outlawed in lots of western countries.

Societies should build a legal environment where this is true for most sane
things companies should be doing and bad things companies should be avoiding.

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sulam
I found it interesting (just started reading it, so this is near the
beginning) that they have no employees in the SF Bay Area. Since I assume they
are using Ruby and RoR (heh), it seems like there must be some filtering
function removing the many talented developers expert in their stack from
their recruiting pool. It could be as simple as salary (maybe they aren't
willing to pay "market-rate" for SV) or it could be something else. Anyone
know?

~~~
ghostly_s
Why would they be willing to pay the hyper-inflated "market-rate" for SV
employees when they are optimized for remote workers, so being located in the
Bay has no value to them?

~~~
sulam
I'm not arguing they should. Just proposing a possible answer that would be
reasonable.

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hedvig
"Open-plan offices are particularly bad at providing an environment for calm,
creative work, they argue. So “library rules” are imposed at Basecamp.
Conversations are kept to a whisper and there are separate rooms when meetings
are needed."

So I take it they do have an open-plan office?

~~~
a-saleh
A.f.a.i.k they are mostly remote, with a small office of ~5 people and few
meeting-rooms?

~~~
mr_ndrsn
12-15 in Chicago. It's nice to work there when I'm in town. Very quiet when it
needs to be, and the team rooms are fantastic for collaboration(if the parties
are there).

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kxr
FWIW, here's a discussion we had on HN looking for companies with a culture
similar to Basecamp's:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16015715](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16015715)

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SnowingXIV
Outline link: [https://outline.com/893xwr](https://outline.com/893xwr)

The Economist is another website that seems to have been plagued by GDPR and
other current web publishing trends.

~~~
sitkack
Funnily enough, that link breaks because it requires Google Analytics.

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skybrian
Sounds great. Are there any other company that have similar values?

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motohagiography
Sounds like a lovely target for private equity. If you own a company that can
afford to do this and want an out, ping me to ghostwrite your self help no-
seller and we can get the jackals circling.

~~~
sitkack
That is morally reprehensible and very smart. Find all the companies that have
such great margins that they can treat their employees well and gut them for
temporary gains.

What about the opposite? Find companies that are massively over staffed and
duplicate their product with 100x less people?

~~~
motohagiography
Missed my calling, apparently. But that's the calculation they make. Could see
a lot of tech companies that raised insane valuations with institutional money
whose revenues are otherwise respectable but don't justify those valuations,
get picked up as distressed assets by PE firms during the next crash.

You need revenue to justify perks, so perks could be a tell. Hmm, glassdoor
should have some data on this...

~~~
sitkack
Brewing 2nd and 3rd order signals. Machine learning, innocuous public
information sources ...

