7 ms·

Twilio cutting 11% – Letter from CEO [pdf]

70 points by nycdatasci 4y ago

HereIGoAgain 4y ago
>"so we were particularly focused on ensuring our layoffs -- while a business necessity today -- were carried out through a Racist/Racially-Oppression lens." Fixed that for you.. And oh boy would I not want to be one of this companies lawyers in the coming months and no doubt years! Yikes
nycdatasci 4y ago
Link to letter: https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0001447669/5c6aa734-ca9d-4d59-84b4-42ab54ca3603.pdf#page=5&zoom=100,24,24 https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0001447669/5c6aa73...
questime 4y ago
What does Anti-Racist layoff mean?
- zmk5 4y ago
  "As you all know, we are committed to becoming an Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression company. Layoffs like this can have a more pronounced impact on marginalized communities, so we were particularly focused on ensuring our layoffs – while a business necessity today – were carried out through an Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression lens." Isn't this illegal?
  - ivraatiems 4y ago
    If proven, yes. I bet Twilio has arbitration clauses in their contracts, though.
    - lotsofpulp 4y ago
      What do arbitration clauses have to do with violating federal non discrimination laws?
      - ejb999 4y ago
        exactly - arbitration clauses are not going to help with obvious race-based discriminatory statements from the president being used to pick who should be fired.
  - alangibson 4y ago
    They're not making any claims of actually having done anything non-figurative.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - fitchip46 4y ago
    Im from Twilio, It's out of context on the email to outsiders, It's just a thing thats everywhere in our wording to be an anti-bias/anti-racist company. It's part of the Twilio values/corporate template. It's not something written for this email in particular.
    - questime 4y ago
      That's good to know - It's strange to me that they don't see how this language could be seen the wrong way on a layoff email. It's not a leap to read this in a discriminatory way.
    - zmk5 4y ago
      Thank you for the context!
    - UnpossibleJim 4y ago
      I've seen you copy/paste thus statement a couple of times in this forum. Can you explain the context if possible, so it makes sense to "outsiders"? We like to learn here.
      - fitchip46 4y ago
        Ive copy pasted it twice, It's a thing, a value - "Be anti racist", we have support groups and communities and regular engagement built on this principal. This was an internal email , although they should have know that this goes out, even then I don't think they would anticipated it. It absolutely does not mean they skewed the results or targeted to keep their diversity intact. what hes saying is we made sure there was no bias , that's all. Although it might read like something else, anyone from twilio would understand as it's a common phrasing.
        phpisthebest 4y ago
        >>even then I don't think they would anticipated it. It is in their 8-K filing to the SEC, how could it not be anticipated that would be public? >Although it might read like something else because the way you are using "Anti-Racism" is not the same as what the wider public know to be the "Anti-Racism" popularized by Ibram Kendi which is much more than just "not racist" or not biased as you claim here
- alangibson 4y ago
  I guess non-racist layoffs would mean not disproportionately laying off minority groups. So anti-racist layoffs would mean disproportionately laying off majority groups? So then it would be anti-racist in the sense of rolling back historical racist impacts. In reality it's probably just empty talk since they know they'd get sued for actually doing anything beyond making promises.
  - rimunroe 4y ago
    > I guess non-racist layoffs would mean not disproportionately laying off minority groups. So anti-racist layoffs would mean disproportionately laying off majority groups? No, it almost certainly just means trying not to disproportionately lay off minority groups. You don't have to swing ist the neutral point and to immediately discriminate against the other side, you just need to stop discriminating. I don't know why so many commenters assume that the only options are to be racist towards non-whites or to be racist against whites. There is a middle ground of just trying to not be racist at all. I imagine you could even come up with a term for it which would really clarify what the thing we're fighting against is, because otherwise people might think that it's trying to push whites down rather than stop pushing other people down. Maybe "anti-racist" would work.
    - alangibson 4y ago
      To be clear, I was just trying to figure out what an nonsense phrase like "anti-racist layoffs" could mean. > Maybe "anti-racist" would work Clearly not, because it's an easily and frequently misunderstood term. Anyway, the problem with anti-racism isn't terminology. It's an individualized solution to a structural problem, and so is doomed to fail just like conscious capitalism et. al.
      - rimunroe 4y ago
        >> Maybe "anti-racist" would work > Clearly not, because it's an easily and frequently misunderstood term. To be clear, that second paragraph was mostly me being frustrated with the fact that a term which seems like it's so straightforward in its meaning is such a source of confusion and outrage for so many people. It's baffling to me that someone would assume "anti-racist layoff" meant "we're going to decide who to fire based on their race". At the very least that's clearly much more of a legal nightmare, and would be an extremely bizarre thing for a company to say out loud.
- ejb999 4y ago
  What can it possibly mean except when given the choice, they chose people to layoff based on their skin color - so in other words, in trying to show they are not racist, they made firing decisions based on race, not based on seniority or performance.
  - rimunroe 4y ago
    That's an absurd interpretation. They almost certainly mean that they're going to make sure to examine who's being let go for evidence of bias. If layoffs usually hit underrepresented groups harder, then the less racist thing to do is to make sure you aren't disproportionately firing, say, all your Black employees. That doesn't mean they're looking to fire more white people.
    - twiceaday 4y ago
      What if reality happens to be 'racist?' What if there naturally happens to be a gender / race to performance correlation at their company at this time? Do you think they will perform their review and stand behind their 'racist' findings? Or do you think they will give more benefit of the doubt to certain people until their layoff gender / race distribution more closely matches their idealized a priori distribution? I think that's the debate here.
      - rimunroe 4y ago
        If someone manages to prove the racists are right then that will be a very weird world to live in and I have no idea how to speculate about it. I’d expect it’s about as likely as someone proving god exists, but I’ve seen overwhelming evidence that people are racist and that that racism permeates society.
        twiceaday 4y ago
        Sometimes the underperformers in a company just happen to skew a particular race. Publicly announcing such a layoff demographic would naturally allow for accusations of racism. That is what I am calling reality being racist. The summary facts of the situation can be called racist and it can be very difficult to defend that accusation without sharing huge amounts of internal data. So companies don't simply stay away from racism, they stay away from decisions that could be called racist. The difference between these two strategies is the problem. Touting anti-racism makes the problem worse, because it widens the gap between the two strategies by weaponizing accusations of racism for any action that remotely allows them. "This company tried to win brownie points by claiming it is not racist but look at this clearly racist thing they did."
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- bubblematrix 4y ago
  It means race was a factor in who was laid off versus who wasn't. Anti-racist terms are inherently racist, given these outcomes are decided based upon a persons race.
belval 4y ago
> Layoffs like this can have a more pronounced impact on marginalized communities, so we were particularly focused on ensuring our layoffs – while a business necessity today – were carried out through an Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression lens. Kill two bird with one stone, fire white/asian to rebalance your "diversity" metrics. I just don't understand how people can be onboard with this.
- rafale 4y ago
  Exactly, diversity (as practiced in the US) and meritocracy are incompatible.
- ivraatiems 4y ago
  If it can be proven that that's what they did, it's likely illegal.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - belval 4y ago
    How would you even begin to prove something like that? No exec would be dumb enough to send an email that says "we see that the bottom 11% in your organization is mostly marginalized groups, we can't let you fire them". It will be a wink-wink nudge-nudge during a 1-1 meeting.
    - ivraatiems 4y ago
      IANAL, but, it'd be tough for sure. You'd need to compare who was fired to who wasn't and contextualize with metrics that made it clear it wasn't coincidence.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - boredumb 4y ago
      "As you all know, we are committed to becoming an Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression company. Layoffs like this can have a more pronounced impact on marginalized communities, so we were particularly focused on ensuring our layoffs – while a business necessity today – were carried out through an Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression lens." Any one who isn't asleep at the wheel is well aware that corporate/institutional newspeak terms like "Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression lens" means anti white and asian.
fitchip46 4y ago
Im from Twilio, It's out of context on the email to outsiders, It's just a thing thats everywhere in our wording to be an anti-bias/anti-racist company. It's part of the Twilio values/corporate template. It's not something written for this email in particular.
- ejb999 4y ago
  So it is part of Twilio's corporate culture to virtue signal?
  - fitchip46 4y ago
    No, it's just to make sure everyone is included, and to be vocal about racist behaviour and biases. There is a lot of engagement for those around this in the company.
    - systemvoltage 4y ago
      No, I disagree from what I've observed. This is a reality and a deliberate agenda. You can read University of California reports on equity, and what the goals are: https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/committees/ucaade/reports.html https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/committees/ucaade/... Similar corporate agenda is driven by ESG initiatives.
  - maxehmookau 4y ago
    I never understood the issue with virtue signalling. Why would we discourage both: A) the act of being nice and showing our virtue B) showing other people the nice thing we did ...honestly I don't get it? Signalling our virtue seems like a great idea and would encourage others to do the same.
    - itronitron 4y ago
      Virtue signaling is all about saying you did the nice thing without showing you did the nice thing. If a company really did the nice thing then it should be visible and they wouldn't have to tell everyone about it. It's that aspect of virtue signaling language that rubs people the wrong way.
gdudeman 4y ago
There are a lot of comments quickly taking issue with and interpreting the phrase “anti-racist” as being actively racist. If you give Jeff he benefit of the doubt here, you can read this to say they’re going to think about whether layoff choices are made with implicit bias and/or racism and be thoughtful about that. It’s possible that the non-benefit of the doubt interpretation is valid, but I don’t see evidence of that here. HN is a place where debate is welcomed, but drive-by comments accusing them of going out of their way to lay off white and Asian employees when there is no indication that’s what they’re doing is not helpful to the discourse.
- bhahn 4y ago
  > implicit bias and/or racism I think it'd be better for them to re-market this principle as "bias-free" or something more generic. Calling it "anti-racist/anti-oppression" is, fair-or-not, going to invite this reaction from outsiders.
- HereIGoAgain 4y ago
  "It's not racist or discrimination because I say it isn't"
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- ejb999 4y ago
  >>If you give Jeff he benefit of the doubt here, Sorry, not giving a virtue-signaling billionaire the 'benefit of the doubt' - he explicitly says that race was taken into account when deciding who to fire and who not to - that is de-facto a racist statement. You don't fix racism by being racist. If jobs need to be eliminated, they should be eliminated by making decisions about which departments/projects/initiatives are no longer needed, which people are no longer performing well, or which area's are not profitable etc. As soon as you say, we took into account peoples race when deciding who should be fired, it is racist, period.
  - ViViDboarder 4y ago
    And if everyone picked every pregnant woman on leave and every minority, leadership should totally just assume that it wasn’t some bias or racism. /s It makes sense to review to ensure that there is no slant to your layoffs to me.
ospzfmbbzr 4y ago
Over the years some of my clients got trapped into being Twilio customers through acquisitions. Without exception every engagement with this company has been a disaster. I have gone to great lengths to get all my clients away from toxic Twilio because I view dealing with them as an unacceptable risk due to incompetence. Maybe they should focus on retaining the COMPETENT staff whoever they are beause they really seem to have a problem supporting their own products and services.
- ehPReth 4y ago
  care to give some examples?
akmittal 4y ago
Layoffs are always heartbreaking, But thankfully they are proving good support > - 12 weeks of pay + 1 week per every year of tenure > - Full value of the next stock vest > - Support to find new roles > - Even more support to those on visas > (Note from me: not much more you can ask for in terms of support + severance these days) https://twitter.com/GergelyOrosz/status/1570049287605690368 https://twitter.com/GergelyOrosz/status/1570049287605690368
saos 4y ago
All these CEO spounting the same line "its my fault" > I take responsibility for those decisions,as well as the difficult decision to do this layoff.
- maerF0x0 4y ago
  I generally would like to see CEOs take responsibility through action, not words. Is the CEO returning their salary, options, stock? Is the CEO giving that returned salary so someone else can continue working? This isn't just about Jeff, but about broken leadership in Corporate America, which more often is about "Skin in the game" until its their skin.
- Zealotux 4y ago
  You can be responsible and not guilty.
nequo 4y ago
The 11% layoff is making me sad because Twilio seems to be offering such a cool service. An API to put together your own automated phone service in your programming language of choosing, covering many countries around the world. Man, does this letter give a long laundry list of justifications: > including, among other things: > adverse changes in general economic or market conditions, including labor shortages, supply chain disruptions, a downturn, recession and inflation; > changes in the market for communications; > the impact of COVID-19 on the Company and its customers and partners; > the Company’s ability to adapt its products to meet evolving market and customer demands and rapid technological change; > the Company’s ability to comply with modified or new industry standards, laws and regulations applying to its business; > the Company’s ability to generate sufficient revenues to achieve or sustain profitability; > general economic conditions, including a downturn or recession and rising inflation, that may adversely affect a prospective customer’s ability or willingness to adopt our products, delay a prospective customer’s adoption decision, reduce the revenue that we generate from the use of our products or affect customer retention; > retention of customer data platforms like the Company’s by organizations in times of macroeconomic uncertainty; > the Company’s ability to effectively manage its growth and increase gross margins; > the Company’s ability to compete effectively in an intensely competitive market; > the Company’s ability to attract and retain qualified employees; > the technical reliability of the Company’s products and platform; > the Company’s ability to successfully integrate its acquisitions and risks that the anticipated benefits of such acquisitions and partnerships and investments may not be fully realized or may take longer to realize than expected; > the Company’s ability to close the transactions associated with such partnerships and investments; the impact of recent and future privacy changes on certain third party platforms on the Company and its customers; > and the Company’s ability to manage changes in network service provider fees that it pays in connection with the delivery of communications on its platform and the impact of those fees on gross margin.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

70 points by nycdatasci 4y ago

>"so we were particularly focused on ensuring our layoffs -- while a business necessity today -- were carried out through a Racist/Racially-Oppression lens." Fixed that for you.. And oh boy would I not want to be one of this companies lawyers in the coming months and no doubt years! Yikes

nycdatasci 4y ago

Link to letter: https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0001447669/5c6aa734-ca9d-4d59-84b4-42ab54ca3603.pdf#page=5&zoom=100,24,24 https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0001447669/5c6aa73...

questime 4y ago

What does Anti-Racist layoff mean?

zmk5 4y ago
"As you all know, we are committed to becoming an Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression company. Layoffs like this can have a more pronounced impact on marginalized communities, so we were particularly focused on ensuring our layoffs – while a business necessity today – were carried out through an Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression lens." Isn't this illegal?
- ivraatiems 4y ago
  If proven, yes. I bet Twilio has arbitration clauses in their contracts, though.
  - lotsofpulp 4y ago
    What do arbitration clauses have to do with violating federal non discrimination laws?
    - ejb999 4y ago
      exactly - arbitration clauses are not going to help with obvious race-based discriminatory statements from the president being used to pick who should be fired.
- alangibson 4y ago
  They're not making any claims of actually having done anything non-figurative.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- fitchip46 4y ago
  Im from Twilio, It's out of context on the email to outsiders, It's just a thing thats everywhere in our wording to be an anti-bias/anti-racist company. It's part of the Twilio values/corporate template. It's not something written for this email in particular.
  - questime 4y ago
    That's good to know - It's strange to me that they don't see how this language could be seen the wrong way on a layoff email. It's not a leap to read this in a discriminatory way.
  - zmk5 4y ago
    Thank you for the context!
  - UnpossibleJim 4y ago
    I've seen you copy/paste thus statement a couple of times in this forum. Can you explain the context if possible, so it makes sense to "outsiders"? We like to learn here.
    - fitchip46 4y ago
      Ive copy pasted it twice, It's a thing, a value - "Be anti racist", we have support groups and communities and regular engagement built on this principal. This was an internal email , although they should have know that this goes out, even then I don't think they would anticipated it. It absolutely does not mean they skewed the results or targeted to keep their diversity intact. what hes saying is we made sure there was no bias , that's all. Although it might read like something else, anyone from twilio would understand as it's a common phrasing.
      - phpisthebest 4y ago
        >>even then I don't think they would anticipated it. It is in their 8-K filing to the SEC, how could it not be anticipated that would be public? >Although it might read like something else because the way you are using "Anti-Racism" is not the same as what the wider public know to be the "Anti-Racism" popularized by Ibram Kendi which is much more than just "not racist" or not biased as you claim here
alangibson 4y ago
I guess non-racist layoffs would mean not disproportionately laying off minority groups. So anti-racist layoffs would mean disproportionately laying off majority groups? So then it would be anti-racist in the sense of rolling back historical racist impacts. In reality it's probably just empty talk since they know they'd get sued for actually doing anything beyond making promises.
- rimunroe 4y ago
  > I guess non-racist layoffs would mean not disproportionately laying off minority groups. So anti-racist layoffs would mean disproportionately laying off majority groups? No, it almost certainly just means trying not to disproportionately lay off minority groups. You don't have to swing ist the neutral point and to immediately discriminate against the other side, you just need to stop discriminating. I don't know why so many commenters assume that the only options are to be racist towards non-whites or to be racist against whites. There is a middle ground of just trying to not be racist at all. I imagine you could even come up with a term for it which would really clarify what the thing we're fighting against is, because otherwise people might think that it's trying to push whites down rather than stop pushing other people down. Maybe "anti-racist" would work.
  - alangibson 4y ago
    To be clear, I was just trying to figure out what an nonsense phrase like "anti-racist layoffs" could mean. > Maybe "anti-racist" would work Clearly not, because it's an easily and frequently misunderstood term. Anyway, the problem with anti-racism isn't terminology. It's an individualized solution to a structural problem, and so is doomed to fail just like conscious capitalism et. al.
    - rimunroe 4y ago
      >> Maybe "anti-racist" would work > Clearly not, because it's an easily and frequently misunderstood term. To be clear, that second paragraph was mostly me being frustrated with the fact that a term which seems like it's so straightforward in its meaning is such a source of confusion and outrage for so many people. It's baffling to me that someone would assume "anti-racist layoff" meant "we're going to decide who to fire based on their race". At the very least that's clearly much more of a legal nightmare, and would be an extremely bizarre thing for a company to say out loud.
ejb999 4y ago
What can it possibly mean except when given the choice, they chose people to layoff based on their skin color - so in other words, in trying to show they are not racist, they made firing decisions based on race, not based on seniority or performance.
- rimunroe 4y ago
  That's an absurd interpretation. They almost certainly mean that they're going to make sure to examine who's being let go for evidence of bias. If layoffs usually hit underrepresented groups harder, then the less racist thing to do is to make sure you aren't disproportionately firing, say, all your Black employees. That doesn't mean they're looking to fire more white people.
  - twiceaday 4y ago
    What if reality happens to be 'racist?' What if there naturally happens to be a gender / race to performance correlation at their company at this time? Do you think they will perform their review and stand behind their 'racist' findings? Or do you think they will give more benefit of the doubt to certain people until their layoff gender / race distribution more closely matches their idealized a priori distribution? I think that's the debate here.
    - rimunroe 4y ago
      If someone manages to prove the racists are right then that will be a very weird world to live in and I have no idea how to speculate about it. I’d expect it’s about as likely as someone proving god exists, but I’ve seen overwhelming evidence that people are racist and that that racism permeates society.
      - twiceaday 4y ago
        Sometimes the underperformers in a company just happen to skew a particular race. Publicly announcing such a layoff demographic would naturally allow for accusations of racism. That is what I am calling reality being racist. The summary facts of the situation can be called racist and it can be very difficult to defend that accusation without sharing huge amounts of internal data. So companies don't simply stay away from racism, they stay away from decisions that could be called racist. The difference between these two strategies is the problem. Touting anti-racism makes the problem worse, because it widens the gap between the two strategies by weaponizing accusations of racism for any action that remotely allows them. "This company tried to win brownie points by claiming it is not racist but look at this clearly racist thing they did."
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
bubblematrix 4y ago
It means race was a factor in who was laid off versus who wasn't. Anti-racist terms are inherently racist, given these outcomes are decided based upon a persons race.

belval 4y ago

> Layoffs like this can have a more pronounced impact on marginalized communities, so we were particularly focused on ensuring our layoffs – while a business necessity today – were carried out through an Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression lens. Kill two bird with one stone, fire white/asian to rebalance your "diversity" metrics. I just don't understand how people can be onboard with this.

rafale 4y ago
Exactly, diversity (as practiced in the US) and meritocracy are incompatible.
ivraatiems 4y ago
If it can be proven that that's what they did, it's likely illegal.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- belval 4y ago
  How would you even begin to prove something like that? No exec would be dumb enough to send an email that says "we see that the bottom 11% in your organization is mostly marginalized groups, we can't let you fire them". It will be a wink-wink nudge-nudge during a 1-1 meeting.
  - ivraatiems 4y ago
    IANAL, but, it'd be tough for sure. You'd need to compare who was fired to who wasn't and contextualize with metrics that made it clear it wasn't coincidence.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - boredumb 4y ago
    "As you all know, we are committed to becoming an Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression company. Layoffs like this can have a more pronounced impact on marginalized communities, so we were particularly focused on ensuring our layoffs – while a business necessity today – were carried out through an Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression lens." Any one who isn't asleep at the wheel is well aware that corporate/institutional newspeak terms like "Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppression lens" means anti white and asian.

fitchip46 4y ago

Im from Twilio, It's out of context on the email to outsiders, It's just a thing thats everywhere in our wording to be an anti-bias/anti-racist company. It's part of the Twilio values/corporate template. It's not something written for this email in particular.

ejb999 4y ago
So it is part of Twilio's corporate culture to virtue signal?
- fitchip46 4y ago
  No, it's just to make sure everyone is included, and to be vocal about racist behaviour and biases. There is a lot of engagement for those around this in the company.
  - systemvoltage 4y ago
    No, I disagree from what I've observed. This is a reality and a deliberate agenda. You can read University of California reports on equity, and what the goals are: https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/committees/ucaade/reports.html https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/committees/ucaade/... Similar corporate agenda is driven by ESG initiatives.
- maxehmookau 4y ago
  I never understood the issue with virtue signalling. Why would we discourage both: A) the act of being nice and showing our virtue B) showing other people the nice thing we did ...honestly I don't get it? Signalling our virtue seems like a great idea and would encourage others to do the same.
  - itronitron 4y ago
    Virtue signaling is all about saying you did the nice thing without showing you did the nice thing. If a company really did the nice thing then it should be visible and they wouldn't have to tell everyone about it. It's that aspect of virtue signaling language that rubs people the wrong way.

gdudeman 4y ago

There are a lot of comments quickly taking issue with and interpreting the phrase “anti-racist” as being actively racist. If you give Jeff he benefit of the doubt here, you can read this to say they’re going to think about whether layoff choices are made with implicit bias and/or racism and be thoughtful about that. It’s possible that the non-benefit of the doubt interpretation is valid, but I don’t see evidence of that here. HN is a place where debate is welcomed, but drive-by comments accusing them of going out of their way to lay off white and Asian employees when there is no indication that’s what they’re doing is not helpful to the discourse.

bhahn 4y ago
> implicit bias and/or racism I think it'd be better for them to re-market this principle as "bias-free" or something more generic. Calling it "anti-racist/anti-oppression" is, fair-or-not, going to invite this reaction from outsiders.
HereIGoAgain 4y ago
"It's not racist or discrimination because I say it isn't"
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
ejb999 4y ago
>>If you give Jeff he benefit of the doubt here, Sorry, not giving a virtue-signaling billionaire the 'benefit of the doubt' - he explicitly says that race was taken into account when deciding who to fire and who not to - that is de-facto a racist statement. You don't fix racism by being racist. If jobs need to be eliminated, they should be eliminated by making decisions about which departments/projects/initiatives are no longer needed, which people are no longer performing well, or which area's are not profitable etc. As soon as you say, we took into account peoples race when deciding who should be fired, it is racist, period.
- ViViDboarder 4y ago
  And if everyone picked every pregnant woman on leave and every minority, leadership should totally just assume that it wasn’t some bias or racism. /s It makes sense to review to ensure that there is no slant to your layoffs to me.

ospzfmbbzr 4y ago

Over the years some of my clients got trapped into being Twilio customers through acquisitions. Without exception every engagement with this company has been a disaster. I have gone to great lengths to get all my clients away from toxic Twilio because I view dealing with them as an unacceptable risk due to incompetence. Maybe they should focus on retaining the COMPETENT staff whoever they are beause they really seem to have a problem supporting their own products and services.

ehPReth 4y ago
care to give some examples?

akmittal 4y ago

Layoffs are always heartbreaking, But thankfully they are proving good support > - 12 weeks of pay + 1 week per every year of tenure > - Full value of the next stock vest > - Support to find new roles > - Even more support to those on visas > (Note from me: not much more you can ask for in terms of support + severance these days) https://twitter.com/GergelyOrosz/status/1570049287605690368 https://twitter.com/GergelyOrosz/status/1570049287605690368

saos 4y ago

All these CEO spounting the same line "its my fault" > I take responsibility for those decisions,as well as the difficult decision to do this layoff.

maerF0x0 4y ago
I generally would like to see CEOs take responsibility through action, not words. Is the CEO returning their salary, options, stock? Is the CEO giving that returned salary so someone else can continue working? This isn't just about Jeff, but about broken leadership in Corporate America, which more often is about "Skin in the game" until its their skin.
Zealotux 4y ago
You can be responsible and not guilty.

nequo 4y ago

The 11% layoff is making me sad because Twilio seems to be offering such a cool service. An API to put together your own automated phone service in your programming language of choosing, covering many countries around the world. Man, does this letter give a long laundry list of justifications: > including, among other things: > adverse changes in general economic or market conditions, including labor shortages, supply chain disruptions, a downturn, recession and inflation; > changes in the market for communications; > the impact of COVID-19 on the Company and its customers and partners; > the Company’s ability to adapt its products to meet evolving market and customer demands and rapid technological change; > the Company’s ability to comply with modified or new industry standards, laws and regulations applying to its business; > the Company’s ability to generate sufficient revenues to achieve or sustain profitability; > general economic conditions, including a downturn or recession and rising inflation, that may adversely affect a prospective customer’s ability or willingness to adopt our products, delay a prospective customer’s adoption decision, reduce the revenue that we generate from the use of our products or affect customer retention; > retention of customer data platforms like the Company’s by organizations in times of macroeconomic uncertainty; > the Company’s ability to effectively manage its growth and increase gross margins; > the Company’s ability to compete effectively in an intensely competitive market; > the Company’s ability to attract and retain qualified employees; > the technical reliability of the Company’s products and platform; > the Company’s ability to successfully integrate its acquisitions and risks that the anticipated benefits of such acquisitions and partnerships and investments may not be fully realized or may take longer to realize than expected; > the Company’s ability to close the transactions associated with such partnerships and investments; the impact of recent and future privacy changes on certain third party platforms on the Company and its customers; > and the Company’s ability to manage changes in network service provider fees that it pays in connection with the delivery of communications on its platform and the impact of those fees on gross margin.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]