Twitter let go of nearly half of its employees on Friday last week, soon after Elon Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of the social network company. In an embarrassing turn of events, Twitter is now asking dozens of fired employees to return to work.
According to people familiar with the matter, some of the employees that are being asked to return were laid off by mistake. What’s worse is that some of them were let go before the management realized that their work and experience were necessary to build the new feature envisioned by Chief Twit Elon Musk. The requests for employees to return to work show how chaotic and rushed the whole process was.
The sources asked to stay anonymous while reporting their findings.
Around 3,700 people were fired from Twitter over the past few days through email as a way to cut costs following Musk’s acquisition of the platform, which closed in late October. Many employees learned that they had lost their job when they were suddenly cut off from company systems including their emails and Slack.
Twitter’s plans to request workers to come back were originally reported by Platformer. The social network giant is yet to respond to a request to comment.
Musk tweeted on Friday to clarify the mass layoffs.
Regarding Twitter’s reduction in force, unfortunately there is no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day.
Regarding Twitter’s reduction in force, unfortunately there is no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day.
Everyone exited was offered 3 months of severance, which is 50% more than legally required.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 4, 2022
Sources have said that Twitter has about 3,700 employees currently on board. Those who are still working with the company are being directed to move quickly in launching new features and some even had to sleep at the office to meet their deadlines.
Speaking of features, Twitter has recently made its blue tick verification a paid privilege. It now comes with Twitter Blue, which is the app’s premium tier that brings extra features. It now costs $7.99, up from the previous $3.99.
