Elon Musk hints at job cuts at Twitter in All Hands meeting

Elon Musk has not been quiet about his stance on remote working.

A fortnight ago he wrote on Twitter that Tesla workers needed to return to the office, or “pretend to work somewhere else”.

In a memo to employees, which was titled “Remote work is no longer acceptable”, Musk wrote “anyone who wishes to do remote work must be in the office for a minimum (and I mean *minimum*) of 40 hours per week or depart Tesla. This is less than we ask of factory workers”.

Now, in his first Twitter All Hands meeting, ahead of his still incomplete $44 billion takeover of the social media giant for $44 billion, Musk was asked by employees about the future of remote work.

Employees have been concerned about the culture at Twitter following Musk’s supposed takeover, which is yet to be finalized. They are concerned by Musk’s previous tweets about the company, including his views on the social media’s strong advocacy of working from anywhere; it has not mandated a return to the office.

Previously, Musk had referred to Twitter’s offices as a “homeless shelter”, because so few employees now worked there.

In the meeting, Musk shared that in-person work would be the “priority”, but he shared that “excellent contributors” would have the option to work from home. This is because it wouldn’t make sense to fire these high performers who can work productively from home.

Musk and job cuts

On the topic of job cuts, Musk was also asked about potential job cuts at Twitter. In mid May, Twitter made two top executives redundant and CEO Parag Agrawal paused hiring – however, the social media giant said no lay offs were planned “at this time”.

Twitter employee concern also came in response to Musk’s announcement two weeks ago that he would “pause all hiring worldwide” at Tesla because of a “super bad feeling” about the economy. He also announced a plan to cut 10,000 (or 10% of) jobs outside of Tesla’s manufacturing plants.

In addition, many other tech companies, including Meta, Uber, Lyft, and cryptocurrency employers like Coinbase and Binance, have had to lay off workers or implement hiring freezes because of shocks to tech stocks.

Musk’s response to Twitter’s employees concerns on job cuts was that the social media giant “needs to get healthy” – “right now, costs exceed revenue – that’s not a great situation” – and that “anyone who is a significant contributor should have nothing to worry about”.

Of course, all of Musk’s comments about the future of Twitter remain only relevant if he actually ends up buying the company. While the deal was announced in late April, as of yet, there has been limited progress.

Stay tuned to see what happens with Musk’s takeover of Twitter.