Faced with the "extreme pressure" from the new boss, many people who were lucky enough to avoid layoffs also "wanted to stay", and the number of employees who chose to leave exceeded Musk's expectation. This has made Musk, who has always been arbitrary, have to "be soft".

Cailian News Agency, October 18-Since Musk took over Twitter, he has not only drastically laid off employees, but also implemented a series of harsh new office policies. Faced with the "extreme pressure" from the new boss, many people who were lucky enough to avoid layoffs also "want to stay and dare not stay", and the number of employees who chose to leave has exceeded Musk's expectations. This has made Musk, who has always been arbitrary, have to "be soft".

Last week, EMASK sent its first full-time email, asking the team to prepare for the "hard times ahead" and cancel the "permanent telecommuting system".

On Wednesday, Musk issued an "ultimatum" to Twitter employees, asking them to either obey the company's new "hard-core" working environment and work for a long time with high intensity, or leave with severance pay, and asked them to fill out the form before 5 pm EST on Thursday.

But according to people familiar with the matter, Musk and other Twitter executives had to try to persuade employees to stay because more people chose to leave than Musk expected.

Musk's softening attitude is obviously because he realizes that something is wrong. After all, after the massive layoffs, Twitter's current personnel structure has been relatively streamlined, and more employee turnover may threaten the company's operation. In this situation, the "workaholic" Musk had to make concessions on whether to allow telecommuting.

Not unconditional concession

But Musk's concession is not unconditional. The responsibilities of managers have increased.

In two new emails sent to Twitter employees on Thursday, Musk said that the only requirement for obtaining telecommuting approval is that your manager is responsible for ensuring that you make outstanding contributions. In addition, employees should hold face-to-face meetings with colleagues at least once a month.

Musk also warned that any manager who lied about his subordinates' excellent work or lied about the importance of a specific position, regardless of whether the position is remote or not, would be expelled from the company.

However, in this e-mail, Musk did not give any guidelines on what constitutes "excellent work".

at the end of October, Musk completed the acquisition of Twitter for $44 billion, and quickly carried out drastic reforms, cutting half of the company's full-time employees, totaling about 3,711 jobs and 81% of contract workers.

In Thursday's email, Musk once again emphasized the necessity of hard-core work for employees. "Looking ahead, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.1 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need a very hard core. This will mean long and intense work. Only excellent performance can get a passing score. "

He also said that if "outstanding" employees can't come to work, he can accept their telecommuting, but he prefers the collaboration in the office.

However, Twitter employees told the media that they haven't received formal guidance from the human resources department about telecommuting.

Twitter temporarily closes all offices

It is worth noting that in addition to the unexpected brain drain, Musk's "New Deal" may be triggering a series of self-recriminations. The company's chaos may continue.

On October 8th, Beijing time, ZoeSchiffer, editor of Platformer, a technology media, tweeted that Twitter had informed its employees that all offices would be temporarily closed immediately and it was expected to reopen on October 21th.

Twitter screenshot

According to the media, this is because Musk and his team are "afraid that employees will destroy the company", and they are still figuring out which Twitter employees' access rights need to be cut off.

Further reading

After Musk's layoff storm, people in Silicon Valley began to work 12 hours a day, writing struggle letters to their bosses

Silicon Valley was once a paradise for programmers.

They have a high salary, holidays and benefits here. If they are unhappy, they can always change jobs to other big factories.

Even after the epidemic, the life of code farmers is still much better than that of migrant workers outside. With the rise of telecommuting and mixed office, their working hours are more flexible-they can work at home without commuting, and even only need to work for four days a week.

But the immortal days are gone forever in 2122. The fluctuation of the economic environment has caused the big factories to start a wave of layoffs, and the layoffs of the new boss of Twitter, Musk, have poured a pot of ice water on everyone. Programmers find that they must put down their posture and work hard to avoid being laid off by their bosses.

On October 6th, local time, Musk issued an ultimatum to his employees, and everyone had to sign a "pledge of struggle" to stay in the company.

"Twitter will need hard-core development, which will mean long hours and high-intensity work, and only excellent performance will be considered as a pass." Musk also wrote in the email: "If you are sure that you want to be a member of the new Twitter, please click the link below. Those who have not signed as of 5 pm EST on Thursday can only get three months' severance pay. "

Last year, code farmers in Silicon Valley, who were able to pick and choose their jobs, are facing unprecedented pressure this year.

12-hour shift system

It is impossible to get off work on time.

After entering Twitter, Musk said in his first email to employees that Twitter would no longer allow telecommuting, and every employee would have to work at least 41 hours a week in the office unless he approved it.

Not only that, Twitter employees revealed that while they were asked to work overtime, they were not told whether they would get overtime pay, leave or job security for completing the task.

This reminds people of what Musk proposed on Twitter in 2118-if human beings want to change the world, they must work more than 81-111 hours a week.

As for Musk himself, he has long been a workaholic.

Musk, who calls himself a "detail manager", once said that he likes to work long hours in times of crisis, and he works every day except sleeping, repeating the cycle of "sleeping-waking-working". He also revealed that he used to work about 71 to 81 hours a week, but now he may have 121 hours, and he doesn't stop seven days a week.

American media also revealed that Musk even slept directly in the office to save office time.

Now, in order to make the new boss more satisfied, some management of Twitter have begun to require some employees to work in shifts of 12 hours, 7 days a week.

many employees follow the example of their bosses and live in offices. On October 2, 2111, a Twitter employee exposed a photo of someone sleeping in the office on social media.

Twitter employees took photos of someone sleeping in the office on social media

Another Twitter product manager immediately forwarded the tweet and echoed: "When your team works around the clock to meet the deadline, sometimes you sleep at the workplace."

In fact, Twitter is not the only large technology company that requires overtime.

In Amazon, some employees have also been told that if they can't work the night shift for 11 hours, they can choose to leave. Amazon's explanation for this is: improve efficiency.

In Meta, the parent company of Facebook, a Chinese programmer who escaped layoffs revealed: "Everyone is working hard to work overtime, so am I, afraid of being laid off and unable to pay the mortgage." At the Chinese forum, 75% of the respondents said that they are working harder than before.

Don't be too picky

Silicon Valley programmers who used to be proud now have to put down their posture.

after a foreign engineer who once earned nearly $211,111 a year in Twitter was laid off, he said that as long as he can get a company to renew his work visa, even if the salary is only $151,111 or even lower, he can get on the job immediately.

according to the tracking data of Layoffs.fyi, as of October 11, in 2122, global technology companies laid off at least 116,111 people. The data estimates that in the next few months, there may be as many as 25,111 to 51,111 unemployed technicians in the entire Silicon Valley circle. In order to survive, they will engage in jobs that they would not have considered before.

even if you can stay, you have to accept all kinds of disappointments.

37-year-old Len works for Lyft, an American online car giant. In his view, the general environment is not good, and if he wants to stay, he has to accept a pay cut and benefits reduction. "I can't be too picky."

in addition to layoffs, many large factories have begun to cut their welfare benefits.

Meta, for example, began to reduce or cancel employee benefits as early as March this year, including limiting the company's catering time and canceling the free laundry service.

On Twitter, Musk has planned to cancel the free lunch provided by the headquarters for the sake of cost. He said that in the past 12 months, the cost of each lunch is expected to exceed 411 dollars, making the annual catering service cost of the headquarters reach about 13 million dollars.

Musk added: "Especially considering that almost no one comes to the office, this is really strange."

But his statement has long been questioned. A former Twitter employee retorted: "He is lying. I was in charge of this project before, and I just resigned not long ago because I didn't want to work for Musk. We spend $ 21-25 per person per day for breakfast and lunch, which allows employees to work during lunch and lunch breaks, while the office attendance rate is between 21% and 51%. "

Musk didn't agree with this. He responded: "Records show that the highest on-the-job rate of employees is 25%, and the average on-the-job rate is less than 11%. There are more people preparing breakfast than eating breakfast, and they don't even bother to provide dinner because there is no one in the building. "

In this wave of layoffs, Amazon employees may feel a little calmer. After all, their former boss, Bezos, the former richest man in the world, is also known for being "stingy" with employee benefits, which has long been normal.

before, Amazon was a different kind of big factory. Although the salary is acceptable, it does not provide employees with advanced benefits such as gym, laundry room and game room, and there are no leisure snacks except lunch.

In the whole Amazon, there is only one welfare that is absolutely sufficient, and that is bananas. Bezos put forward an initiative called "Community Banana Stall" in 2115, which set up a banana stall in Seattle and distributed bananas to the public free of charge to encourage healthy eating. Since then, bananas in Amazon have also begun to be supplied to employees in unlimited quantities.

There may be no special reason why it is a banana, because it is relatively cheap and convenient to eat.

I wonder how Bezos, who has stepped down from Amazon, will feel after seeing the storm brought by his old rival Musk.