Coinbase is looking to hire someone to lead its internal diversity efforts

Crypto exchange Coinbase is on the hunt for a new diversity executive — a move that follows a public backlash for a blog post penned by its CEO about its avowed apolitical mission. 

According to a job ad, the director-level position for belonging, diversity, and inclusion will "plan, execute and deliver experiences that foster belonging for all employees, and with a specific focus on creating equitable opportunity for underrepresented employee groups." 

In September, Armstrong drew the ire of certain corners of the tech community for a blog outlining why he thought politics should be kept out of the workplace. Nearly 5% of the firm's 1,200 employees accepted a severance package Armstrong offered to employees uncomfortable with his position. Reports have tied recent developments at the firm with tensions from earlier this year over an all-hands meeting in which a question about Black Lives Matter sparked an employee walk-out.  

The firm's previous head of belonging, inclusion, and employee experience, Tariq Meyers, left the firm over the summer. It is not clear what was behind his exit. In any case, Meyers was one of the company's most senior Black employees. During his time at Coinbase, he played a role in addressing issues such as mental health, as noted by a feature in Forbes.

As for the new position, the employee's role would have a business-driven responsibility, in addition to building communities and managing employee resource groups. 

"Take a data-driven approach to BID, which includes owning (and iterating) on our existing framework for measuring the impact and effectiveness of belonging, inclusion, and diversity, and connect what we see in the data to an understanding of BID’s impact on culture and the Coinbase experience," the job ad says, adding:

"Leverage new and existing data to make informed decisions throughout the employee life cycle, from how we attract and select talent, to how we grow and retain it."