Twitter: Elon Musk bans teleworking and warns of “difficult times” in an internal email

Elon Musk, the new CEO and owner of Twitter, has removed the company’s remote working policy and ordered all employees back to the office in his first email to staff since taking over the company. company, Bloomberg reported. This marks a further impact on the company’s workforce after almost half of its staff were made redundant last week.

Essential facts

• According to Bloomberg, Musk’s first email sent to employees late Wednesday-Thursday warned of “difficult times ahead” for the company, adding that there was no way to “water down the message “.
• Musk also ended Twitter’s lenient remote work policy that has been in effect since the start of the pandemic.
• In his email, Twitter’s new CEO reportedly said the policy change would take effect immediately and that employees should be in the office “at least 40 hours a week.”
• Any deviation from the remote working policy will have to be personally approved by Elon Musk himself, the report adds.
• As advertisers flee Twitter over content moderation concerns, Musk wants $8-a-month subscriptions to the new Twitter Blue to account for half of Twitter’s total revenue, a far cry from the current situation where 90% of revenue of the company come from advertisements.

Key Context

Elon Musk’s first official email to Twitter employees comes days after the company laid off nearly half of its workforce, parting ways with several major teams. The whole dismissal process was so chaotic that the company eventually had to ask some of the dismissed workers to come back to the company. Among those who have been asked to return are those who were allegedly fired “in error” and others whose new management did not anticipate the skills would be needed to help build some of the new features requested by Musk. Last week, Twitter was also the subject of a class action lawsuit accusing the company of violating federal and state labor laws by not giving laid off workers adequate notice. Along with canceling telecommuting, Musk also scrapped Twitter’s ‘days off’ policy, which was one extra day off per month for the entire company and which had also come into effect during the pandemic. .

Tangent

Musk has expressed his distaste for remote work several times this year. In June, Tesla’s CEO scrapped telecommuting at the electric car company and ordered his management staff to work a minimum of “40 hours a week” from their desks or take time off. Asked on Twitter about people wanting to work remotely, Musk replied that they should “pretend to work somewhere else”. In his email to Tesla workers, Musk reportedly added, “If you don’t show up, we’ll assume you quit.” At an event in May, Musk slammed American workers, saying, “People are trying to avoid going to work altogether.” The billionaire’s sting at American workers came after he praised Tesla factory workers in China, who he said were willing to work until 3 a.m. or even not not leave the factory if necessary.

Article translated from Forbes US – Author: Siladitya Ray

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