The chaos on Twitter is a reality. It has been a weekend of vertigo in the offices, now owned by Elon Musk, after Black Friday: it was the day of mass layoffs. Now, just a few hours later, Twitter is backing down on some of the selected ones who received the email to leave the company.
As anticipated Bloomberg, Twitter made some mistakes when selecting some of the 3,000 employees for dismissal. Some, they point out, entered the lists by accident. Others represented an essential workforce for the development of some of the new features that Elon Musk’s company is preparing.
It has not been until now when they have realized the mistake made. All despite the fact that the employees themselves warned that it was something that could happen sooner or later. It is also added the speed with which Elon Musk himself wanted to fire most of the staff. Just a week after taking the reins of Twitter. And although some areas’ days were numbered – the entrepreneur’s aversion to certain activities in private companies is well known – the technical areas did not have time to analyze the impact of the lack of personnel in a short space of time.
Of the almost 3,800 employees on the exit lists, the communication and human rights area was reduced almost entirely. It was not a surprise, already at Tesla, Elon Musk decided that communication and marketing did not fit with his work policies. But also that of ethical AI or research. Now, in the attempt to win back dozens of staff from him, it seems that Elon Musk would need to reinvigorate a part of the area tied to Android and iOS developers.
Notices in Europe to Elon Musk’s Twitter firing policies
With the return or not of dozens of employees dismissed by “error”, the reality is that Twitter has marked a before and after in its history. One that Meta is copying: Zuckerberg himself just announced massive layoffs at Meta. The reason? The same as on Musk’s social network: stop wasting money and cut back on non-strategic areas. Or at least that they can adjust spending, since Facebook’s metaverse will be one of the hardest hit by the cut.
Be that as it may, now Elon Musk has to face a new rival on Twitter: the European unions. And more specifically those of Spain. A local staff, made up of about 30 people, who have received their dismissal letter practically in its entirety. 26 of them are no longer part of the squad. Dedicated to marketing and communication tasks for the most part, it was more than expected.
On this, local unions have launched to denounce Musk’s decision. They remember that collective dismissals must be subject to a series of requirements and guarantees for employees. As well as undergoing debate with the representatives of the Twitter workers. They must also be notified 15 days in advance. As expected, an Elon Musk opposed to union groups has not taken into account any of these requirements. If not complied with, the dismissals could be declared null.