Elon Musk gave Twitter employees a deadline Thursday to decide whether they wanted to work for him, and he asked those who did not share his vision to leave, further agitating a staff that has already dealt with extensive layoffs, mass executive departures, and repeated business missteps under the billionaire’s ownership.
Musk made the revelation to staff in an early-morning email on Wednesday. The email’s subject line was “A Fork in the Road.” Musk highlighted that Twitter had a long road ahead and offered staff three months’ severance if they would not want to work there “to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0.”
Since completing his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter over three weeks ago, the billionaire has been relentless in rapidly transforming the company. Musk quickly laid off half of Twitter’s 7,500 employees, sacked thousands of contractors, fired staff who had opposed him, and reduced infrastructure expenses.
He has also stated that Twitter must increase its revenue or risk bankruptcy. In addition, he has promoted subscription services while simultaneously courting and alienating Twitter’s sponsors.
Giving existing staff a deadline to depart allows Musk to decrease expenses further while clearing the firm of unhappy personnel. In addition, Musk has assembled a group of confidants and staff from his previous firms, including Tesla, to assist him at Twitter.
Musk told Twitter staff on Wednesday that they would have to work very hard. “In an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hard core,” he wrote. “This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.”
More Twitter employees have openly expressed their displeasure with Musk’s leadership, and the company’s workforce might be significantly cut if many people accept the offer to quit.
Musk dismissed over two dozen employees on Tuesday for criticizing his leadership in tweets or on the company’s internal messaging channel, Slack. Furthermore, in a tweet on Tuesday, the billionaire stated that the launch of Twitter Blue would be postponed until November 29 to ensure that it was “rock solid.”
