Coinbase To Flatten Management Layers in AI Restructure
Brian Armstrong, Chief Executive Officer of Coinbase, has told staff the company will cut 14% of its workforce as it restructures around AI.
The cryptocurrency exchange will lay off around 700 employees. Brian says AI has changed the pace of work within the company.
"We are adjusting early and deliberately to rebuild Coinbase to be lean, fast and AI-native," he wrote in an email to staff. "We need to return to the speed and focus of our startup founding, with AI at our core."
Nearly half of the 80,000 tech sector layoffs reported in Q1 of 2026 were attributed to AI, according to industry data.
Reducing management layers
Brian says Coinbase is changing how it operates. The company is flattening its organisational structure so there are just five layers below him.
Each leader could have 15 or more direct reports. Brian says this will help create teams that can move quickly and ensure every leader is an active contributor.
"Managers should be like player-coaches, getting their hands dirty alongside their teams," he wrote.
Other companies are pursuing similar approaches. Jack Dorsey, Chief Executive Officer of fintech firm Block, which announced in February it would lay off 40% of its workforce, revealed on the Long Strange Trip podcast he is planning to reduce middle management layers from five down to two or three. Jack says in an ideal scenario the company would have no layers at all.
"In the most ideal case, you know, there is no layer. Everyone in the company reports to me, and that would be all 6,000 of the company," Jack said. "And that feels somewhat ridiculous when you consider the old structure, but when you consider that the majority of our work is going through this intelligence layer, it's a lot more manageable."
Concentrating on AI talent
Brian says Coinbase will concentrate around AI-native talent to manage fleets of AI agents. The company will use AI to experiment with reduced pod sizes.
It is testing one-person teams that can balance engineering, design and product management. Brian has been emphasising AI at Coinbase for some time.
He revealed on Stripe Co-founder John Collison's podcast in September that employees had been fired for not using AI. Brian was told it would take two quarters to reach 50% AI adoption within the company.
Despite this, Brian said he posted in the company's Slack channel that he wanted all employees to be onboarded with the technology by the end of the week. Those who had not used the technology by the end of the week were asked to attend a Saturday meeting.
"I jumped on this call on Saturday and there were a couple people that had not done it," Brian said. "Some of them had a good reason because they were just getting back from some trip or something, and some of them didn't, and they got fired."
Brian said that, while some people did not like the approach, he believes it set clarity in how the company needed to lean into AI.
