Around 4,400 of Twitter’s about 5,500 contract workers were suddenly terminated over the weekend. This round of cuts, which was first reported by Platformer’s Casey Newton, involves both US-based and global contract employees working in content moderation, real estate, marketing, engineering, and other departments.
Newton, who first reported about the cuts on Saturday evening, also notes that contractors were not notified of their termination — at least not before finding out that they have lost access to their company email and Slack accounts.
The company also reportedly failed to let managers know of the job cuts, and they too only found out after seeing that their colleagues’ accounts in Twitter’s system had been deactivated.
The termination was formalized via email about an hour after the contractors learned that they had lost access to their accounts, according to a report by Insider. The publication was also able to get a copy of the email sent to the contractors, which said that the cuts were part of the company’s “reprioritization and savings exercise,” and said that their last official last day of engagement is on Monday, November 14th, but they will not “be expected to perform any services on November 14th.”
The company has been in chaos since Elon Musk took over in late October. Musk, who has said that Twitter is losing $4 million a day, has so far slashed about half of the company’s workforce, including almost its entire communications department and 15% of its trust and safety team since the departure of its top executives.
Around the same time as Newton’s tweets about the new job cuts, Musk apologized for “Twitter being super slow in many countries.” Users responding to Newton were quick to point out the coincidence.
Information for this briefing was found via Twitter, Platformer, The Verge, CNBC, Axios, Fortune, and the sources and companies mentioned. The author has no securities or affiliations related to this organization. Not a recommendation to buy or sell. Always do additional research and consult a professional before purchasing a security. The author holds no licenses.
