Coinbase, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the US, boasting more than 98 million users and more than 4,900 employees, said in May it would be “slowing hiring so we can reprioritize our hiring needs against our highest-priority business goals,” amid a downturn in the broader crypto sector, according to a company blog post.

Just two weeks later, despite the company’s assurances that it would escape the latest crypto winter unscathed, chief people officer L.J. Brock wrote that due to “the current market conditions and ongoing business prioritization efforts, we will extend our hiring pause for both new and backfill roles for the foreseeable future and rescind a number of accepted offers.” Emphasis ours.

Coinbase isn’t alone. Spokespersons for Twitter and Redfin confirmed that both companies have also rescinded offers recently, in a phenomenon that seems to be becoming more common in the current tech industry’s climate. For a company mulling a decision to pull back offers, there are both legal and reputational considerations that must be weighed, according to experts who spoke with HR Brew.

Foremost among them is staving off a PR backlash. Rescinding job offers is a big reputational risk, as the first thing many people receiving a rescinded offer will do is go to the internet and post about their experience. Companies, said Kate Bischoff, an employment attorney in Minneapolis, “don’t want to ruin their employment reputation.”

Which kinda makes sense. Job-seekers today have lots of data to review as they are finding their next gig, whether that’s on social platforms or reading reviews on sites like Glassdoor. These pieces of information can shape a brand’s reputation.

“Companies live and die by how people perceive them,” Christopher Cathcart, an adjunct professor of public relations at California State University, Northridge and Syracuse University, explained to HR Brew.

“If there’s an impression that [companies] haven’t been honest, or operated with high levels of integrity, particularly [with] something as sensitive as hiring…it can have a ripple effect down the line to how people perceive them writ large relative to their brand and impact on their ability to sell products and provide and offer services,” Cathcart said.

Rescinding an offer is a “shitty move,” said Martin Burns, editor in chief of the Recruiting News Network, because “most folks who would have accepted offers that get rescinded have resigned from their old job. So they’re stuck.” Keep reading here.—SB

Do you work in HR or have information about your HR department we should know? Email [email protected] or DM @SammBlum on Twitter. For completely confidential conversations, ask Sam for his number on Signal.

For anyone curious about whether the Elon Musks of the world are winning the roiling RTO debate, there’s this workplace occupancy barometer, a weekly metric of office attendance in 10 major US metro areas, compiled by the security research firm Kastle Systems. At a glance, it shows an approximation of how many workers are actually filing into offices and could help you, the savvy HR professional tasked with devising RTO policies that don’t lead to employee turnover, cut through the noise using hard data as your machete.

How does it work? Kastle’s website explains that it tracks data generated from the “KastlePresence app, keycard, and fob usage in the 2,600 buildings and 41,000 businesses we secure across 47 states.” To compile its weekly report, the company’s focus is more narrow, tracking how often its products are used to enter office office buildings in Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Austin, Washington, DC, San Jose, New York, Dallas, and Philadelphia.

The week of June 1, office attendance in these metros was at 41.2%, down from 43.4% the week of May 11. It isn’t a complete snapshot, of course, since it only cites access to buildings granted by Kastle products. But it could help you gauge where your organization’s RTO policy stands in relation to others in your area. As you’re likely aware, RTO plans writ large are a mess and have been a mess for quite some time. Here’s where things stand currently:

The debate rages on

• Earlier this month, Musk issued a mandatory in-office attendance policy for “everyone at Tesla,” according to leaked emails he sent to the company’s executive staff. The news prompted a firestorm of both criticism and support for the world’s richest man.
• Last month, Apple delayed its policy of mandatory office attendance at least three times a week for workers at its corporate headquarters, citing a rise in Covid-19 cases in the Bay Area.
• Some companies are scaling back RTO plans in light of soaring gas prices. “We are seeing many organizations start to take a step back in light of a very dramatic and rampant spike in gas prices,” Mercer workplace expert Ravin Jesuthasan told CBS News in April.
• Still, some corporate leaders are steadfast in their support of in-office attendance. Tom Siebel, CEO of the AI firm C3 AI, instituted mandatory attendance last June. He recently told the New York Times: “For people who want to work at home on Zoom, there’s companies that are like that,” he said. “Go work for Facebook. Go work for Salesforce.”

Bottom line. The office remains at an impasse, and the dilemma doesn’t seem to be fading away for workers and their employers anytime soon. Ultimately, it might take more than Lizzo to coax workers back to their desks.—SB

Do you work in HR or have information about your HR department we should know? Email [email protected] or DM @SammBlum on Twitter. For completely confidential conversations, ask Sam for his number on Signal.

Today’s top HR reads.

Stat: New data from a workplace-management software provider indicates that enterprise companies with more than 1,500 employees have seen a 51% increase in workplace visitor traffic so far this year. (Envoy)

Quote: “They’re tired of the San Francisco workforce, which they think is full of spoiled nitwits who are there one day and gone the next.”—Jim Cramer on how some tech CEOs feel about younger workers (CNBC)

Read: The author of the new book Ambitious Like a Mother: Why Prioritizing Your Career Is Good for Your Kids on how the pandemic has upended  “workplace structures” for mothers. (The Cut)

Oops, onboarding oversight: In this tight labor market, a bumpy onboarding process can often lead to an unexpected off-boarding. Check out HR Brew’s article covering cringeworthy workplace onboarding mishaps (and avoid their mistakes) here.

Keeping up with today’s changing workplace is like Wile E. Coyote trying to catch the Road Runner. That is to say, never-ending. Meep meep!

Luckily, you’re not alone. The whole world—and in particular, the world of HR—is trying to manage these ongoing seismic shifts and anticipate at least a few months hours ahead. We wanted to talk to someone deep in the thick of it, so we’re sitting down with Fiverr CHRO Sharon Steiner on June 16 at 12pm, at our latest virtual event, sponsored by Securian. We’ll be discussing the accelerated evolution of modern employment and how it all factors into hiring for the future. Register here.