Twitter during the big resignation after Elon Musk’s ultimatum
Although their new boss asked them to “quit them all or go”, many workers would choose the latter option on Thursday, raising fears for the stability of the platform in the coming days.
A day after Elon Musk’s ultimatum asking employees who survived the first wave of layoffs to choose between giving up, Twitter was flooded with walkouts on Thursday, Nov. 17. “thoroughly, unconditionally”or leave (“Join or leave the new hardcore Twitter”). “I may be exceptional, but (…) I’m not unconditional” (“hardcore”)for example, tweeted Andrea Horst, whose LinkedIn profile is still visible “Supply Chain Manager (survivor) on Twitter». She added the hashtag “#lovewhereyouworked” ie. “I love where you work”, like many other employees who announced their choice. The Twitter profile bios of several departing engineers on Thursday described them as “soft engineers” or “hardcore ex-engineers” in a plea to their new bosses. A fired employee told Reuters that the entire team would have decided to step down and leave the company together. According to several sources, Elon Musk met with some of his engineers and tried to convince them to stay idle.
The figures for this new wave of startups are not yet known. Reuters estimates them to be several hundred. 42% of 180 respondents chose yes in a survey conducted by the Blind business app, which authenticates employees through their email addresses and allows them to share information anonymously. “Take the exit option, I’m free!” A quarter say they chose to stay “reluctant”and only 7% of respondents say they do “Click yes to stay, I’m a fan”. In a private conversation at Signal with about 50 Twitter employees, about 40 said they had decided to leave, according to a former employee. About 360 people joined the new channel in a private Slack group for current and former Twitter employees. “voluntary dismissal”. A separate survey from Blind asked employees to estimate the percentage of people who would leave Twitter based on their perception. More than half of the respondents estimated that at least 50% of employees would quit.
Blue hearts and hello emojis flooded Twitter on Thursday, the second time in two weeks that employees of the bluebird network said goodbye. By 6:00 p.m. EST, more than two dozen employees in the U.S. and Europe announced their departures in Twitter posts reviewed by Reuters, though not all of their resignations went unnoticed. can be independently verified.
In the countryside, there are no people left to repair in many places. »
Anonymous employee
According to Zoe Schiffer, a journalist for the specialized media Platformer, Twitter notified all its employees on Thursday afternoon that the offices in San Francisco, California are temporarily closed and inaccessible even with a sign. According to an inside source, security guards started removing employees from the office on Thursday evening. The social network, which has lost several members of its communications team, did not respond to Reuters’ request for comment. The flurry of new startups includes many engineers to fix bugs and prevent service outages, raising questions about the platform’s stability in the coming days. The version of the Twitter app used by employees began slowing down Thursday evening, according to a source familiar with the matter, who speculated that the public version of Twitter might not stop overnight. “If it breaks, there are no people left to repair it in many places”, said this person, who did not want to be named for fear of retaliation. The hashtag #RIPTwitter topped trends from Thursday to Thursday.
For three weeks on Wednesday, Elon Musk, the owner and CEO of Twitter, asked the employees of the social network to make an individual commitment. “working long hours at high intensity”, “Building the revolutionary Twitter 2.0 and succeeding in an increasingly competitive world”. “Only exceptional performance will be worth the price”, he said in this internal letter, consulted by AFP. Workers had until Thursday afternoon to click the box “yes”, was sentenced to leave Twitter with compensation equal to three months’ salary. A method that is at odds even in the United States, where labor laws are less protective of workers than in many developed countries.
“It was a great adventure”
Half of the group’s 7,500 employees were already fired by the multibillionaire two weeks ago. “I’m speechless, I’m grateful to be able to say that I got my dream job and achieved more than I thought possible. It was a great adventure.”, Twitter’s director of customer relations, Deanna Hines-Glasgow, tweeted Thursday, according to her LinkedIn profile. He identifies himself as “Ex Tweep,” a Twitter employee nickname, and “Blackbird,” a support group for the California company’s African-American employees.
“To all the Tweeps who decided today would be the last day: thank you for being amazing colleagues through the ups and downs. I can’t wait to see what you do next.”Esther Crawford, the platform’s director of product development, said she was one of the few managers who neither resigned nor was fired and still publicly supported the new leader.
