Twitter Employees Leave, Following Elon Musk’s “Extremely Hardcore” Ultimatum
Not long after Elon Musk became the new owner of Twitter, the company’s engineers and other employees were given the option to either commit to “hardcore” work or resign with severance pay.
Musk has fired half of Twitter’s 7,500 full-time employees since he took over on October 27, 2022, in addition to an unknown number of contractors who were in charge of content moderation and other essential tasks. On his first day as Twitter’s owner, he dismissed key executives with others departing on their own accord later. He again started firing a select number of employees recently for criticizing him in public or on Twitter’s private Slack messaging platform.
On the company’s internal Slack message platform, hundreds of workers indicated they were quitting before the deadline set by Elon Musk.
Some people tweeted their decision to stop working following the deadline and according to a worker who was fired earlier during the mass layoff action, several employees used a private forum other than the company’s message board to discuss their impending departure, raising concerns about how it may affect their U.S. visas or if they would receive the promised severance compensation.
After the deadline, Twitter management sent an unsigned email declaring that offices will be closed and employee badge access would be suspended until Monday, November 21, 2022.
One employee who accepted the voluntary layoff spoke under the condition of anonymity due to the need for confidentiality in order to receive severance pay and said no explanation was provided following the badge suspension.
The most recent batch of departures indicates that the platform is still losing employees as it prepares for the 2022 FIFA World Cup, one of the busiest occasions on Twitter, which, if things go wrong, may shamble up its services .
“To all the Tweeps who decided to make today your last day: thanks for being incredible teammates through the ups and downs. I can’t wait to see what you do next,” Esther Crawford, who is still a Twitter employee tweeted.
Musk then issued an email to Twitter’s surviving workers, stating that the company is fundamentally a software and server company and requesting that they make a decision regarding their future with the company.
To create “a breakthrough Twitter 2.0,” Musk wrote, personnel “will need to be extremely hardcore” and success will require working long hours with high intensity.
Musk, though, changed his mind requiring that all remaining employees work from the office in an email sent on Thursday, November 17,2023. Many of the survivors of the first layoffs were offended by his early rejection of remote work.
In an email to staff, he softened his earlier tone, adding that “all that is required for approval is that your manager takes responsibility for ensuring you are making an excellent contribution.” Workers would also be expected to have “in-person meetings with your colleagues on a reasonable cadence, ideally weekly, but not less than once per month.”
“RIPTwitter” was the top trending subject in the United States, followed by other social media platforms; “Tumblr,” “Mastodon,” and “MySpace.”
Author-Roberta Appiah
