Inside the Workplace Revolution at Controversial Dating App Ashley Madison

Remote work is old news at ruby Life, the technology company behind the controversial married dating platform Ashley Madison. Like many organizations, it’s in the process of closing its offices. First to go will be its HQ in Toronto, where more than 110 employees work. But at the same time it’s writing new policies — policies typically associated with larger organizations like Netflix and LinkedIn. Remote work proved to be a stepping stone to bigger things for ruby Life, whose app is used by millions of people across 50 countries. For example, it began offering an unlimited vacation period from January this year, and moved to a four-day week one year ago. “I’d love to say we had this amazing plan, and this is how it was going to work, but it kind of evolved,” said Tara Bedford, vice president of human resources. “We gave everyone a couple of days off last summer, as Covid was draining everybody. We did that a couple of times, and didn’t notice any impact. People wer