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Elon Musk bans remote work at Twitter

9 points by eternalban 4y ago

eternalban 4y ago
from the source: -- Elon Musk has banned remote work at Twitter in his first email to staff since buying the company, warning that the social media platform needs “intense work” in the office to turn round its fortunes. “The road ahead is arduous and will require intense work to succeed,” he wrote in a company-wide email sent to employees on Thursday morning and seen by the Financial Times. “We are . . . changing Twitter policy such that remote work is no longer allowed, unless you have a specific exception.” Employees must be in the office for a minimum of 40 hours per week, except for those “physically unable to travel” or with “a critical personal obligation”, according to the email. Musk added that he would review and approve any exemptions to the policy himself, instructing managers to compile lists of any staff seeking to continue remote working. The new policy at Twitter matches Musk’s demands at another company he runs, Tesla, where in June he insisted staff should turn up for work at least 40 hours a week in the office, or find new employment. The email to Twitter employees, which was first reported on by Bloomberg, was the first they have received directly from Musk since his $44bn takeover of the social media platform. Musk has instead used his personal Twitter account to publicly brainstorm new initiatives and products for the company. The move has been received with frustration by some staff who moved further away from the office during the pandemic and are now faced with long commutes, said two former Twitter employees. Former chief executive Parag Agrawal had said in March this year before Musk offered to buy the company, that staff could work from home “full-time forever”. [tweet omitted] One Twitter employee said: “It’s not a massive surprise given how he does things at other companies. [The] manner of the comms and the lack of notice haven’t helped bring people with him.” Bruce Daisley, Twitter’s former European vice-president, said: “It is an easy management mistake to conclude that employees working from home are less productive or collaborative than those in the office . . . [but] remote workers work more, not less. Generally when we feel like we can sustain a better work-life harmony, we find ourselves happier in our jobs. Musk might find that his team end up more frustrated by this additional jab at them.” Musk began slashing the company’s 7,500-strong workforce last week “in an effort to place Twitter on a healthy path” as he warned that the platform had experienced a “massive drop in revenue” since his takeover was completed. Musk has also asked staffers to work round the clock on new products including a subscription charge for users to get access to a blue tick on their profile, as well as features such as the edit button. Twitter’s new office rules put it at odds with its social media rivals, who all have flexible working in place. At TikTok, staff were asked to return to the office for at least two days a week from September this year, while Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, has encouraged remote working, with several top executives based away from the company’s headquarters.
- prirun 4y ago
  Twitter employees need to implicitly amend that email, from: > Employees must be in the office for a minimum of 40 hours per week to: Employees must be in the office for exactly 40 hours per week. God he's an asshole. Just a way to get people to voluntarily quit so he doesn't have to pay severance. I hope the good ones are looking for jobs and leave him high and dry.
  - eternalban 4y ago
    Just rubber necking myself and most of these ceo types seem to be that way, possibly a job requirement. iirc he did insert an ominous note regarding the future of the economy and possibly that was intended to imply a high cost to snap quitting. But far more interesting to me /g is: "HashBackup uses a block-level incremental strategy that can restore any version directly and is designed to efficiently handle backups with thousands of incremental versions." Do you have a write-up on this? Love to see it.
whywhywhywhy 4y ago
Saw this coming a mile away, expect the rest to follow soon. Apple didn’t spend billions on that campus for it to sit empty.
- jleyank 4y ago
  That glass palace is a sunk cost. It if helps apple recruit and work, great, otherwise it will be viewed as a white elephant and symbol of an old-style company. Not every good hacker wants to live in sv let alone the us.
- dekhn 4y ago
  If I worked at Apple (I did get a nice offer a few years back but declined) I wouldn't want to work in that building- too distracting. (I agree they didn't spend the billions for it to be empty but now both Google and Apple have nice-looking but not super-useful headquarters. They could have saved the money and put it elsewhere)
AHOHA 4y ago
At this point, the ones who got fired should be grateful, not just banning WFH, but also in few months I recon they will be burnt out from the extra work with tight timeline and fewer resources overall. Will he pay for their commute? No? then they should count it in the "minimum 40hrs a week"
guplop 4y ago
And he composed that email while working remotely. What a hypocrite.

9 points by eternalban 4y ago

from the source: -- Elon Musk has banned remote work at Twitter in his first email to staff since buying the company, warning that the social media platform needs “intense work” in the office to turn round its fortunes. “The road ahead is arduous and will require intense work to succeed,” he wrote in a company-wide email sent to employees on Thursday morning and seen by the Financial Times. “We are . . . changing Twitter policy such that remote work is no longer allowed, unless you have a specific exception.” Employees must be in the office for a minimum of 40 hours per week, except for those “physically unable to travel” or with “a critical personal obligation”, according to the email. Musk added that he would review and approve any exemptions to the policy himself, instructing managers to compile lists of any staff seeking to continue remote working. The new policy at Twitter matches Musk’s demands at another company he runs, Tesla, where in June he insisted staff should turn up for work at least 40 hours a week in the office, or find new employment. The email to Twitter employees, which was first reported on by Bloomberg, was the first they have received directly from Musk since his $44bn takeover of the social media platform. Musk has instead used his personal Twitter account to publicly brainstorm new initiatives and products for the company. The move has been received with frustration by some staff who moved further away from the office during the pandemic and are now faced with long commutes, said two former Twitter employees. Former chief executive Parag Agrawal had said in March this year before Musk offered to buy the company, that staff could work from home “full-time forever”. [tweet omitted] One Twitter employee said: “It’s not a massive surprise given how he does things at other companies. [The] manner of the comms and the lack of notice haven’t helped bring people with him.” Bruce Daisley, Twitter’s former European vice-president, said: “It is an easy management mistake to conclude that employees working from home are less productive or collaborative than those in the office . . . [but] remote workers work more, not less. Generally when we feel like we can sustain a better work-life harmony, we find ourselves happier in our jobs. Musk might find that his team end up more frustrated by this additional jab at them.” Musk began slashing the company’s 7,500-strong workforce last week “in an effort to place Twitter on a healthy path” as he warned that the platform had experienced a “massive drop in revenue” since his takeover was completed. Musk has also asked staffers to work round the clock on new products including a subscription charge for users to get access to a blue tick on their profile, as well as features such as the edit button. Twitter’s new office rules put it at odds with its social media rivals, who all have flexible working in place. At TikTok, staff were asked to return to the office for at least two days a week from September this year, while Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, has encouraged remote working, with several top executives based away from the company’s headquarters.

prirun 4y ago
Twitter employees need to implicitly amend that email, from: > Employees must be in the office for a minimum of 40 hours per week to: Employees must be in the office for exactly 40 hours per week. God he's an asshole. Just a way to get people to voluntarily quit so he doesn't have to pay severance. I hope the good ones are looking for jobs and leave him high and dry.
- eternalban 4y ago
  Just rubber necking myself and most of these ceo types seem to be that way, possibly a job requirement. iirc he did insert an ominous note regarding the future of the economy and possibly that was intended to imply a high cost to snap quitting. But far more interesting to me /g is: "HashBackup uses a block-level incremental strategy that can restore any version directly and is designed to efficiently handle backups with thousands of incremental versions." Do you have a write-up on this? Love to see it.

whywhywhywhy 4y ago

Saw this coming a mile away, expect the rest to follow soon. Apple didn’t spend billions on that campus for it to sit empty.

jleyank 4y ago
That glass palace is a sunk cost. It if helps apple recruit and work, great, otherwise it will be viewed as a white elephant and symbol of an old-style company. Not every good hacker wants to live in sv let alone the us.
dekhn 4y ago
If I worked at Apple (I did get a nice offer a few years back but declined) I wouldn't want to work in that building- too distracting. (I agree they didn't spend the billions for it to be empty but now both Google and Apple have nice-looking but not super-useful headquarters. They could have saved the money and put it elsewhere)

AHOHA 4y ago

At this point, the ones who got fired should be grateful, not just banning WFH, but also in few months I recon they will be burnt out from the extra work with tight timeline and fewer resources overall. Will he pay for their commute? No? then they should count it in the "minimum 40hrs a week"

guplop 4y ago

And he composed that email while working remotely. What a hypocrite.