Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal faces employee anger as they anticipate mass exodus after Musk's criticism
Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal faced the wrath of employees during a company-wide meeting where they questioned the managers on how they were going to handle an anticipated mass exodus prompted by Elon Musk, whose $44 billion takeover proposal was approved by the microblogging site's board earlier this week.
The employees fear losing their jobs as Musk has repeatedly criticised the social media platform's content moderation practices and a top official responsible for setting speech and safety policies.
Reuters reported that executives said the company would monitor staff attrition daily, but it was too soon to tell how the buyout deal with Musk would affect staff retention.
According to the report, Musk is in favour of salary reduction of both employees and board members and has even pitched lenders for this.
However, he is unlikely to order job cuts until assumes the ownership of the company.
"I'm tired of hearing about shareholder value and fiduciary duty. What are your honest thoughts about the very high likelihood that many employees will not have jobs after the deal closes?" one Twitter employee asked Agrawal, in a question read aloud during the meeting, Reuters reported.
To this, Agrawal said, "I believe the future Twitter organization will continue to care about its impact on the world and its customers."
The employees expressed concern over Musk's erratic behaviour hampering Twitter's business and hurting it financially.
Addressing the issue of attrition rate, the executives told the employees that the attrition rate hasn't changed compared to what it was before the sudden news of the takeover by Musk.
Earlier, Musk's tweeted Twitter's top lawyer, Vijaya Gadde, who is a Twitter veteran and respected across Silicon Valley. His verbal attack triggered a wave of online harassment targeting her.
"Do we have a strategy in the near-term on how to handle advertisers pulling investment," one employee asked, reported Reuters.
Twitter is going to give a presentation to advertisers in New York next week.
Responding to the employees Sarah Personette, Twitter's chief customer officer, said the company was working to communicate frequently with advertisers and reassure them "the way that we service our customers is not changing."
Reuters reported that the employees have little faith in what the executives told them.
Agrawal is estimated to receive $42 million if he were terminated within 12 months of a change in control at the social media company, according to research firm Equilar, stated the report.
He told the staff during the meeting to expect change under the new leadership and that the company could have performed better over the years.
"Yes, we could have done things differently and better. I could have done things differently. I think about that a lot," he said, said the report.
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