According to an unsigned internal document obtained by The Verge, Twitter has informed staff that it would reduce its worldwide workforce on Friday, November 4th. As stated in the message, workers will get an email by 9 AM PST on November 4th clarifying whether they have been laid off or not, and employee badge access to Twitter’s facilities would be “temporarily” disabled.
This news comes just a week after Elon Musk became the new owner of Twitter and immediately began overhauling the company’s operations and development strategy. Since then, Twitter has been rife with a conjecture regarding the timing and breadth of the planned layoffs.
This information was also shared by Journalist Benny Johnson. In a tweet, Benny wrote, “Cuts at Twitter begin under Elon Musk as employees receive emails informing them to go home and not return to the offices on Friday.”
“By 9AM PST on Friday Nov. 4th, everyone will receive an individual email with the subject line: Your Role at Twitter.” pic.twitter.com/htPIOy86pe
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) November 4, 2022
“In an effort to place Twitter on a healthy path, we will go through the difficult process of reducing our global workforce on Friday. We recognize that this will impact a number of individuals who have made valuable contributions to Twitter, but this action is unfortunately necessary to ensure the company’s success moving forward,” the document reads.
“Given the nature of our distributed workforce and our desire to inform impacted individuals as quickly as possible, communications for this process will take place via email. By 9 AM PST on Friday, Nov. 4th, everyone will receive an individual email with the subject line: Your Role at Twitter. Please check your email, including your spam folder,” it further adds.
Elaborating on denying access to its facilities, it reads, “To help ensure the safety of each employee as well as Twitter systems and customer data, our offices will be temporarily closed and all badge access will be suspended. If you are in an office or on your way to an office, please return home.”
At last, the memo reads, “We acknowledge this is an incredibly challenging experience to go through, whether or not you are impacted. Thank you for continuing to adhere to Twitter policies that prohibit you from discussing confidential company information on social media, with the press or elsewhere. We are grateful for your contributions to Twitter and for your patience as we move through this process.”
The layoffs are part of Musk’s effort to cut Twitter’s expenditures. The memo is vague on the number of layoffs, but Musk will probably let go between 50 and 75 per cent of Twitter’s 7,500 employees. According to employees who witnessed the talks, Musk’s group of senior advisers from outside spent the last week selecting which engineers and technical managers should be kept on board, mostly based on their most recent codebase contributions.
Musk said investors overpaying for the deal
Before the Twitter deal, Elon Musk stated that he and his investors are unquestionably overpaying for Twitter, but he also expressed delight at the purchase of the social media behemoth. He described Twitter as a “languished” asset for a long period. “Myself and the other investors are obviously overpaying for Twitter right now. The long-term potential for Twitter in my view is an order of magnitude greater than its current value,” Musk stated.
Musk attempted to back out of the purchase of Twitter in May, claiming that the firm undervalued the number of bot and spam accounts on the social media network, sparking a series of litigation between the two sides. However, Musk switched stance earlier in October and stated that he will proceed with the acquisition on the original conditions.
On the first day of taking over Twitter, Elon Musk fired CEO Parag Agarwal, legal head Vijaya Gadde and CFO Ned Segal.
