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So there's two options right - the first is that Parag is for some reason making big strategic decisions about the direction of the company despite the fact tha
by Traster 4y ago
So there's two options right - the first is that Parag is for some reason making big strategic decisions about the direction of the company despite the fact that we all know he'll be gone if the deal closes. Or he's making big strategic changes at the behest of the acquirers before the deal closes.
Neither of these things seem particularly kosher moves to make. The question is how to figure out which one it is.
It would seem weird for Parag to be following Musk's orders given how Musk has behaved. It also seems weird for Musk to already have the insight into the company to know specifically who to fire. There's not much advantage to making these changes now.
On the other hand, going rogue and making big strategic decisions about the company really has the potential to burn Parag's reputation for wherever he would move next.
I guess there's a third option - that Musk has expressed a specific view, Parag has a different view, but that they both think that this move is necessary anyway so just got on and did it.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- cycrutchfield 4y agoOr the deal is not going to close?
- belter 4y ago"SEC is investigating Elon Musk over his late disclosure that he had purchased Twitter stock" https://www.businessinsider.com/sec-investigates-elon-musks-twitter-stake-disclosure-report-2022-5?international=true&r=US&IR=T https://www.businessinsider.com/sec-investigates-elon-musks-...
- Sebb767 4y agoWas there a time in the past few years where Musk wasn't actively investigated by the SEC? Hasn't hindered his business ventures much, so far at least.
- rabite 4y ago
- nickstinemates 4y agoIn this version of events, it's likely we'll be able to see how lean Twitter could actually be.
- LightG 4y agoHope so.
- cronix 4y agoAnother option - get rid of the talent before the next guy comes in to run it, because you don't like him.
- TameAntelope 4y agoYou're discounting the very real possibility that Parag is operating as if the deal will not go through, and is making large strategic decisions in anticipation of that being the case. For Parag, I don't see it "burning his reputation" at all, considering either a) he's right and will face the tall task of helming a Twitter that continues to disappoint its investors or b) he's wrong and it won't be his problem when Elon fires him next year.
- Traster 4y agoBut what's changed? If Parag wanted to go this direction why didn't he do it when he took over as CEO?
- e-clinton 4y agoIt’s been like 5 months. I’d imagine he’s still learning about the issues.
- devmunchies 4y agoHe's been at twitter for 11 years and was the CTO, should take a couple weeks to get up to speed on the knowledge delta between CEO and CTO.
- Infinitesimus 4y agoYou might be underestimating the complexity of being a good CEO (not to say he is) at a public tech company under a lot of global government scrutiny.
- sulam 4y agoA thoughtful CEO doesn’t take the role and immediately start making changes. It takes some time to absorb what’s going on.
- Traster 4y ago
- tempnow987 4y agoMy own guess is that this is doubtful that Musk drove this. That said, he is a very large shareholder already, and so if he, as a large shareholder, communicated something to the board, and they acted, then the claim that isn't kosher rings a bit hollow - large shareholders communicate with boards and some activist ones go further. Internally I suspect there is some concern about Musk. The head of legal was reportedly crying regarding this buyout. They've got their misinformation management efforts around the biden laptop story and other issues (vaccines etc etc) that musk may not back as fully as Gadde did. So they could be moving some deck chairs in advance of Musks arrival. Be interesting to see how it shakes out, may not be smooth - Twitter is HQ'ed in San Francisco.
- next_xibalba 4y ago> So there's two options right There are far more possibilities than those two. Here's just one off the top of my head (I assign no probabilities here, just pointing out this false binary): This person is being fired as a result of some investigation or process that began prior to the acquisition process and whose results have only just been reached. There are a whole range of process driving, "my hands are tied" scenarios that could explain this.
- twic 4y agoAnother would be that this person was doing something that could derail the deal (deliberately or not), and the CEO felt the best thing to do was to protect the deal by firing him. Given that he's on paternity leave, and "Parag asked me to leave after letting me know that he wants to take the team in a different direction", that doesn't seem likely.
- fooey 4y agoThey could have ignaled that they're not willing to work for Musk, so they're being shown the door ahead of time to minimize turmoil later on.
- Macha 4y agoAlthough if you were fired after being investigated and the company is keeping it quiet, then surely going with the standard "spend some time with the family excuse" and keeping it quiet rather than drawing attention to that fact would be basic self preservation.
- lkxijlewlf 4y agoAnother possibility is the interim person lobbied hard to have the job and made some rather convincing arguments.
- sounds 4y agoThere's more to this than just today's events supporting your theory that the wheels were in motion before Elon's bid - https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/21/technology/twitter-security-team.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/21/technology/twitter-securi...
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- adrianmonk 4y ago> So there's two options right - the first is that Parag is for some reason making big strategic decisions about the direction of the company despite the fact that we all know he'll be gone if the deal closes. Or he's making big strategic changes at the behest of the acquirers before the deal closes. It's conceivable that he already had a backlog of changes in his mind that he wanted to do at some point, sooner or later. But due to acquisition coming, sooner or later has turned into now or never. If he legitimately believed these changes were best for the company before, he might still believe so. In other words, yes, there's a reason, but not necessarily a nefarious one. It could be, or maybe it's as innocuous as urgency.
- ibejoeb 4y agoSo many possibilities. Top people with favorable clauses might be finagling their own golden parachutes.
- morelisp 4y agoAlso my first thought - you'll probably get a better severance from your long-time coworker than the new guy who came in with the stated belief you've done everything wrong.
- darawk 4y agoI think there's also the possibility that Parag is vying to keep his job as CEO, and so he's trying to guess what he thinks will impress Musk, and executing on it while he's still in charge.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- donohoe 4y agoHe is on paternity leave so unclear how much any of these options hold-up.
- ManBlanket 4y agoWhat about the possibility guy was going to be asked to leave regardless of recent events, but the executive team decided the least they could do after he put in good time is allow him to collect some PTO on parental leave before handing him the official pink slip? I don't know what Twitter's benefits are but I imagine they have an, "unlimited leave" policy. Could be they've disagreed for a while and an argument came to an affront similar to, "Look man, I'm going to take leave to spend time with my new child, then we'll decide if it's the right move for me to return." Frankly this is a pretty boring conspiracy regardless, people leave jobs all the time. All I have to say is I hope dude enjoys a nice Summer with his family without worrying about this dumb product that for the most part narcissists use to trick themselves into thinking anybody gives a shit about what they have to say.
- Shadonototra 4y agotwitter has no strategy, it became apparent the day they killed vine, and it is still true today
- mlindner 4y agoThis has nothing to do with Musk so I wouldn't try to attribute it to him.
- romanhn 4y agoOthers provided a bunch of alternative options. I'll throw another one in the mix. Parag has been a CEO a few short months. If he's about to be out, he won't have much to show for his time. Bold moves now can show potential future boards of directors that he has what it takes to take on this role elsewhere.
- marricks 4y agoIsn’t there usually some sort of removing of the skeletons from the closets before a deal closes? Yahoo revealed there massive data breach while their deal was closing and such.
- m12k 4y agoIt's also possible the deal provided an ad-hoc loyalty test and these to execs failed it.
- spoonjim 4y agoFourth option is that the deal doesn't go through. Deals fail to go through all the time. If you just sit around and the deal doesn't go through you're fucked. The CEO's job is to manage the company as though the deal won't go through, until it actually closes.
- hemreldop 4y ago
- faangiq 4y agoBurn his reputation? No one knew who this guy was 2 weeks ago. Now he will just fail up like all other execs.
- ineedasername 4y agoThere's a third option, which is that Parag is doing what he things is in the best interests if the company under the circumstances. Because regardless if whether the acquisition falls through or not, this whole thing has underscored the need for changes at Twitter. The top two execs may need to go in order to move forward no matter what. Your options are reasonable guesses as well, just not the only two possibilities.
- lettergram 4y agoImo mostly likely scenario is they’re removing evidence / firing people as if the evidence is discovered. If you saw their prior earnings they were over reporting by at least a million users. The people they fired would have potentially known that, or at the very least should have. Further, due diligence will be done prior to sale. At which point items such as the above can / will be discovered. Finally, there have been a lot of political decisions made by Twitter (banning a sitting president, etc). If that was done at the behest of government (as some claim) or advertisers (others claim). The result is the same, they made a decision which strategically let Trump start a competing and growing platform. Not good for business. In any case, I suspect that’s the reason for firing.
- lettergram 4y agoAnd what do you know? > Twitter deal temporarily on hold. Elon Musk wants to evaluate if spam and fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of the platform's users base. https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1525049369552048129 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1525049369552048129
- maxerickson 4y agoWhat if they wanted to leave and he gave them cover? What if the board wanted them out? There's lots of possibilities that don't have much to do with ol' Musky.
- soheil 4y agoA third possibility is the stock market tanking and inflation rate spiking. Many top companies are either freezing hiring or downsizing. However, it does look better on the balance sheet when you get rid of two of your major cash burning expenses and their future vesting schedules. CAP rate = net operating income / value of the asset Basically you can immediately increase the value of your company by lowering expenses without having to justify a lower CAP.
- javajosh 4y agoWell as CEO it's his Parag-ative.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- 704FF43A 4y ago> On the other hand, going rogue and making big strategic decisions about the company Parag isn't a strong character like that. He's someone who plays by the rules and only says empty conventional things, without any personal opinion or feeling, couched in formal modern US corporate/tech language, with the required progressive veneer. I'm pretty sure he only thinks things along similar lines.
- sam345 4y agoNot weird that he's doing things at behest of Musk which I think is likely. It may be part of acquisition agreement either implicitly or explicitly. Musk most likely has people he knows in company (he is friends with Jack) that are advising him and suggesting changes. Much easier to oust top execs before coming in then later.
- throwawaylinux 4y agoIn what way has Musk behaved that makes it weird for Parag to be following his orders?
- pbreit 4y agoAgree. This seems very odd. They should be all hands on deck through the buyout and then see what new ownership wants to do.
- hericium 4y ago> It also seems weird for Musk to already have the insight into the company to know specifically who to fire If in his viewpoint (he wouldn't be alone thinking so) Twitter recently became less appealing - booting the Lead of Consumer Product team seems perfectly reasonable to me. Despite "we know he'll be gone" Parag may as well want to try to keep his chair when Elon takes over and is making changes that would be favored by the new leadership. And if the deal doesn't pass - firing the team leads (possibly) responsible for company's recent bad press and maybe Elon's move itself seems justified.
- ChuckMcM 4y agoSeriously? Having been on both sides of a number of acquisitions I can tell you that these kinds of personnel changes are made typically at the (possibly indirect) request of the acquiring company. Things like "We've got a really create CMO that we're bringing on, we don't need any headwinds to them getting traction quickly" means "Get rid of the people who think they are in charge of marketing so that our person can set the table they want to set it." Or, "Some of our team is uncomfortable with Bob in the role he's in, he just doesn't seem like a good fit you know?" or any number of ways to communicate what executives they want moved out so that there will be spaces to be filled when the new team moves in. And in a deal like this where there is no "plan B" the CEO's exit compensation is entirely predicated on their ability to "set the table" well for the incoming executive team. So yeah, Parag is doing what Musk or Musk's team told him need to be done prior to starting there, and if he told them he wouldn't do it then no big package for him.
- richardwhiuk 4y agoThat would normally happen post close. You are normally mandated to maintain the current operating position prior to close.
- ChuckMcM 4y agoI understand the 'normally' part as in "this is how it should be done." And yet in the roughly ten or so acquisitions I've been on the "inside" for (which is to say was at one of the two companies and was related either peripherally or intimately in the transaction from start to finish), every single one of them had some executive shuffling (aka separating) prior to the close. Clearly, it is biased to Silicon Valley and my experience is probably different than someone who worked in non-tech companies, but if I put it into a rule of sorts I'd say; During a fund raising round executive positions are the most secure and individual contributors the least, during an acquisition these are reversed.
- blenderdt 4y agoThere are a lot of other options as well. Maybe he already wanted to make those changes but didn't dare to make them. Maybe he now changed his mind thinking: if I don't Musk will. And on goes the list of reasons you can think of..
- trashtester 4y agoLook at the tweets of these guys a few months back. Both have several positive mentions of Tesla, Starlink and/or Musk himself. They may actually be Musk fanboys.... It may be that they are fired because Parag and the other leaders are concerned they will (or have already) share(d) information or otherwise cooperate(d) with Musk in ways Parag wants to prevent.
- miohtama 4y agoTwitter full of spam bots, user numbers not genuine and all growth in fake users might be justifiable reason for firing: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1525049369552048129 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1525049369552048129
- Blackstrat 4y agoThird possibility is getting Musk to withdraw his offer. The article comments on missed intermediate growth targets. Musk has put the deal on holding pending proof that the user count is not inflated by fake accounts. So I see this all as an attempt by Parag to "save" the company from Musk and his goal to make it an open "free speech" platform.
- tikiman163 4y agoThere is also a simple possibility that these two executives would have been fired anyway. Average executive tenior at a company is only about 4 years, and executives leave or are asked to leave pretty frequently. As for the hiring freeze, new funding sources are essentially cut off until the purchase either goes through or officially fails. New loans or lines of credit requests are likely to be reject due to the uncertainty around whether Twitter will be acquired or not, and addition sales of stock would be seen as a bad faith act because it would essentially lose the company funding if the sale goes through. Increased spending could cause liquidity issues for Twitter for this reason. It is a known fact that Twitter is not a particularly profitable business, and given all of these facts those executives may have been let go purely for financial reasons. Trying to read into this without more knowledge regarding internal motivations is purely speculative and cannot provide reliable information. What's more, every major company would be aware of these likely motivations and would see his actions as ordinary under the circumstances even if it turns out his motivation was to keep Musk from having access to those employees. In short, there would have be extremely compelling evidence of intentional malfeasance for this to impact his reputation or future career prospects any more than Musk acquiring Twitter.