Half of Twitter’s 7,500 employees have lost their jobs.
The reeling week that Elon Musk took over Twitter began with sleepless nights for the company’s engineers — and ended with half of employees getting the ax.
“It’s been a strange week,” said one former employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
“The executives were fired or resigned, but there was essentially no official communication until 5 p.m. Thursday,” about seven days after the deal was formalized.
The employees received an email first on Thursday informing them that they would know their fate the next day. On Friday, a second email confirmed the rumor: 50% of employees lost their jobs.
The layoffs hit the marketing department heavily, which makes up two-thirds of the design department and possibly 75% of the managers. According to Yoel Roth, the platform’s head of safety, content moderation has been somewhat bypassed, with a layoff rate of just 15%.
After 24 hours with no resolution of layoffs, Musk finally tweeted that “unfortunately there is no other option as the company is losing more than $4 million/day” and all those who lost their jobs were given a “Ask for a 3 month severance.”
The decision to fire didn’t come as a surprise to the employees — the rumors were increasing — but they were shocked by how brutal it was.
Emmanuel Cornet, a French engineer who has worked at Twitter for a year and a half, said: “People will find out not by any phone call or any email… but just by seeing the machine. their work laptop automatically reboots and goes blank,” told AFP on Friday.
Action-matching class
Cornet was fired on Tuesday after being told in an email that he had “violated” several company policies without further explanation, after spending the weekend in the office doing the job. projects launched by the new owner.
“I’m still trying to figure out what the real reason is,” he said.
The Tesla CEO had engineers from his flagship company skydive to evaluate the work of Twitter developers, specifically examining the volume of code generated by each, Cornet said.
He is one of five former Twitter employees who have filed a class-action lawsuit against the company alleging that they did not receive the 60-day notice required by the Federal Warning Act of 1988 in the event of a factory shutdown. doors or mass layoffs.
The Frenchman said many laid-off colleagues are in an unresolvable position in terms of health insurance or visas.
“Some on parental leave. A colleague was born yesterday, but was fired today. “
Those who are fired must continue to abide by the company’s rules for the period of notice. Many fear that the new management will find reasons to accuse them of misconduct and not pay them severance.
“If someone says something disparaging or does anything they can use to fire them for cause, they’ll do it instead of firing them,” said the former employee, who declined to be named.
A summer exodus
For six months, the foundation’s employees had been preparing for the possibility that the world’s richest man could take control.
He is preceded by his reputation, from the punitive job rate in his factories to his refusal to work remotely, which is common in the tech sector, and his autocratic vision. him about free speech, which his detractors argue can only lead to harassment, misinformation and a tolerance for hate speech.
This summer, more than 700 people left on their own, before they even knew if the $44 billion acquisition would succeed.
The fundamental change in corporate culture was confirmed as early as last Friday, when teams of engineers were mobilized to redesign certain features in very short time, with their work in progress.
“Perhaps there are too many layers of management… Twitter is not an efficient and well-oiled machine,” said the former employee, who declined to be named. “But I don’t know if (mass layoffs) will fix it.”
“I think a lot of people who stay now will leave, and maybe that’s what Elon wants,” he added.
“I feel sorry for anyone who didn’t get fired (to be honest). Elon will run the rest with his bad ideas,” said James Glynn, head of content moderation based in London, who was fired, reacts.
“Any kind of Twitter that we know of before is dead.”
© 2022 AFP
Quote: Anatomy of the week tornado Musk hit Twitter (2022, November 6) accessed November 6, 2022 from https://techxplore.com/news/2022-11-anatomy-week-musk- tornado-twitter.html
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