Elon Musk and Twitter are going through one of their most serious crises since the billionaire took control of the social network on October 27.
When the ultimatum given by their new boss expired on November 17, more than a thousand employees decided to leave the company. In an email sent to the platform's 3,700 employees on November 16, Musk asked them to choose between working long hours to help revamp Twitter 2.0 or leaving the company with three months of severance pay.
"Going forward, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore. This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade," the billionaire wrote.
"If you are sure that you want to be part of the new Twitter, please click yes on the link below," he continued. "Anyone who has not done so by 5pm ET tomorrow (Thursday) will receive three months of severance."
But while Musk had hoped the number of employees choosing to leave would be manageable, he found himself with a significant surge, which may pose risks to Twitter's business and the entire platform. All of this caused confusion because the company no longer knew who was going to have access to the premises and its assets.
As a result, Musk has decided to close its offices until Monday, November 21.
"Effective immediately, we are temporarily closing our office buildings and all badge access will be suspended," the company wrote in a memo sent to employees. "Offices will reopen on Monday, November 21st."
"Thank you for your flexibility. Please continue to comply with company policy by refraining from discussing confidential company information on social media, with the press or elsewhere. We look forward to working with you on Twitter’s exciting future."
Musk Closes Twitter Offices
This decision shows the difficult and complicated situation in which the billionaire and Twitter find themselves. He had to bring back some employees who had been laid off.
The billionaire, however, displayed his defiance. He says the employees who decided to stay are the best.
"The best people are staying, so I’m not super worried," he wrote on Twitter despite media headlines describing a chaotic situation.
He said that there was more than a chance that Twitter would survive.
"Don’t wanna jinx it, but there’s a chance we can keep Twitter alive …" Musk posted.
And nearly an hour later, Musk claimed Twitter user numbers were at an all-time high. He took the opportunity to taunt his critics.
"And … we just hit another all-time high in Twitter usage lol," Musk said, adding "Let that sink in …"
The new wave of departures comes just days after Musk cut half the firm's workforce, or 3,700 jobs, in one day.
After Musk took the company private last month, he immediately fired the CEO, the CFO, and other high level executives. He also fired half of its staff by sending emails or revoking privileges from Slack or their laptops while contractors were laid off this week also without any notice.
His latest efforts to slash costs at the company have been widely publicized since he fired engineers who had long tenures at Twitter due to their disagreements with him either on the site or in the company's Slack channels, a messaging service used by employees.
His brash leadership style has also led to hasty decisions such as adding and pausing Twitter Blue, an $7.99 a month service for users to receive the once hailed blue check mark. But after many public companies such as pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly (LLY) were impersonated and lost millions of dollars in market capitalization overnight, several ad and media buying agencies told their clients to stop advertising on the microblogging website.
Musk said on November 15 that a revamped Twitter Blue will be launched on Nov. 29.
