Elon Musk has laid off another 200 employees, around 10% of it’s remainng workforce, in the latest round of job cuts since Elon Musk took over last October.
Layoffs targeted product managers, data scientists and engineers as well as one product manager and Musk devotee Esther Crawford who led the relaunch of Twitter Blue.
The director of product management famously committed herself publicly to Musk’s Twitter 2.0 hardcore office culture when a picture of herself in a sleeping bag with a sleeping mask on in the office was shared widely in November, 2022.
On Sunday, before the dust from the significant round of firings had settled, Musk shot off a tweet that some are saying is a cryptic nod toward those who were fired, and those who weren’t.
‘Hope you have a good Sunday,’ he wrote. ‘First day of the rest of your life.’
Twitter owner Elon Musk axed another 200 employees – roughly 10 percent of his remaining staff – from the social media platform at the weekend
Musk shot off a tweet that some are saying is a cryptic nod toward those who were fired
In what could, again, easily double as an ominous nod to the terminated 200, Twitter user Richard Heart responded: ‘Except for those where today is their last.’
The layoffs impacted the largest number of people at the company since Musk told employees during a meeting in late November that no more plans for staff reductions were being made, following a massive layoff earlier in the month.
Employees at the weekend suddenly lost access to their Slack channel, which led many to believe a purge was about to begin and many think it is not yet over.
The latest cuts primarily hit product managers, of which Crawford was one, as well as data scientists and engineers who worked on machine learning and site reliability, according to the New York Times.
Staff took to an anonymous platform for verified workers to detail the cuts as they unfolded at the weekend.
‘People receive email at 2am on saturday and access cut immediately. This will go down as one of the most extreme layoff in entire corporate history,’ read a post on Blind.
The poster claimed layoffs hit the project management department the hardest and were spread across human relations, sales and marketing, engineering and finance .
Crawford, who before joining Twitter, founded a small screen-sharing and video chat app called Squad, which Twitter acquired in 2020, saw her role eliminated.
As did Haraldur Thorleifsson, who created the design studio Ueno, which the company bought in 2021.
Martijn de Kuijper, a senior project manager, said he found out about lay off after being locked out of his email account.
The cleaning house of most of the product team has led some to speculate that Musk is preparing to bring in entirely new teams.
Musk flagged changes in November to turn Twitter into a more hardcore work environment, warning staff they will need to be on board or leave the company.
The billionaire has been shrewd and direct about the financial turmoil facing the company and made clear prior to his official acquisition that cost-cutting would be the number one priority.
Employees at the time were told they needed to sign a pledge to be able to stay on in their roles. Staff received an email that read: ‘If you are sure that you want to be part of the new Twitter, please click yes on the link below.’
It linked to an online form, in which Musk told employees that if they did not sign by 5pm Eastern time on Thursday they would get three months of severance pay.
Esther Crawford – Musk devotee and someone who had committed to the new hardcore way of life at Twitter – was among those who were shown the door over the weekend
Twitter corporate headquarters is seen in San Francisco, California on on November 04, 2022 – just as the period of chaotic layoffs began to unfold
Following that episode, the picture of Crawford laying on a brightly lit conference room floor went viral with the hashtag #SleepWhereYouWork attached.
Many online mocked her, saying sleeping at the office points to an obviously unhealthy relationship with work and that she would likely be fired within weeks anyhow.
As news of her firing broke, Crawford took the platform that she spent nights on a floor for to defend herself. She wrote: ‘The worst take you could have from watching me go all-in on Twitter 2.0 is that my optimism or hard work was a mistake.
‘Those who jeer & mock are necessarily on the sidelines and not in the arena. I’m deeply proud of the team for building through so much noise & chaos.’
Many Twitter users logged back on to congratulate those who had been correct about predicting Crawford’s demise at the company.
TIMELINE OF ELON MUSK’S CHAOTIC ATTEMPT TO TAKEOVER TWITTER
April 2: Musk announces that he owns 9.2 percent of the company, making him its largest single shareholder
April 14: Musk offers to take Twitter private at $54.20 a share, valuing the company at $44billion
April 25: Twitter accepts Musk’s offer
April 29: Musk sells $8billion in Tesla shares to finance deal
May 13: Musk says Twitter deal is on hold pending a review of bot accounts
May 26: Musk is sued by Twitter for stock manipulation during takeover
July 8: Musk says he’s backing out of the deal. Twitter sues, trying to force him into seeing it through.
October 4: Musk proposes again to go ahead with the deal at the original price
October 17: Proposed trial date in Delaware
October 26: Musk visits Twitter HQ with a sink, updates his bio on the site to ‘Chief Twit’ and sets his location to Twitter HQ
October 27: Musk’s $44 billion takeover of Twitter is finally completed
October 28: Musk fires top Twitter employees, including CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal and top counsel Vijaya Gadde, the woman responsible for banning President Trump after the January 6 riots last year.
October 30: Twitter employees are told by Musk to make verified accounts a feature that’s exclusive to Twitter Blue, the platform’s paid subscription service
October 31: Musk confirms he’s the new CEO of Twitter and dissolves the board of directors
Early November: Half the company is fired
Late November: Musk assures the remaining staff that no more major layoffs are in the works
February 25: Another 200 staffers are unceremoniously fired
source:dailymail
