Two months after Elon Musk declared his intent to acquire Twitter in a $44 billion deal, the billionaire spoke directly with Twitter employees. Nothing he said seemed to reassure workers, and since then, waves of employees have left the company.
At that virtual meeting in June, Musk spoke to Twitter employees about topics ranging from aliens to layoffs being needed to ensure the health of the company. Already, employees had expressed frustration and disappointment with the deal reached in April. In the three weeks after, Twitter saw about 100 workers leave the company, according to two people with knowledge of the company's operations and attrition rate.
This trend of increased attrition has only continued as Musk and Twitter entered an ongoing legal saga after Musk said he no longer wanted to buy Twitter. As of late September, the company saw a net loss of more than 700 full-time workers globally, the people, asking not to be identified due to discussing company matters, said. Many workers cited Musk and the "instability" surrounding the acquisition as a reason for leaving, one of the people said.
A Twitter spokesperson said the company expected an increased level of attrition even before the Musk deal came about, and that macroeconomic factors have affected hiring and retention.
Twitter reported in a February disclosure that it had a headcount of around 7,500 people. The company continued to hire through the first half of the year, swelling to about 8,200 people in June, according to the people familiar with the matter. Now it has lost roughly the same number of employees it hired this year, and its workforce has shrunk by 9% on a net basis.
"We're really starting to feel it now," a current employee said, referring to the impact of attrition on individual teams. Some teams have lost up to a third of their staff, they said.
Attrition has been so high that Twitter cited it in court proceedings as one of the damaging effects of Musk's attempt to back out of the deal. It increased even more sharply since early August, when many workers' restricted-stock units fully vested, meaning they could cash out their shares, the people familiar said. About 300 people left the company between the end of July and the second week of August on a net basis, they said, and another 200 have left since.
Twitter imposed a broad hiring slowdown in May and laid off dozens of people in July, but it's hired about 280 employees since June, according to Linkedin. While the company expected some people to continue leaving voluntarily this year, and even changed how it categorized why people left the company to reflect Musk's impact, leadership did not expect so many people to leave, one of the people familiar said.
Now, there is talk internally of a new focus on backfilling positions, even as a hiring slowdown officially stays in place, an employee said. In the last week, Twitter has posted scores of open positions on LinkedIn, from brand strategists and engineering managers to privacy experts.
Still, employees have told Insider that they receive "last day" emails and notes multiple times a week from colleagues leaving the company.
"The general morale is so low," a worker who recently left Twitter previously told Insider. "But for sure, people started to leave because of Elon."
Are you a Twitter employee or someone with insight to share? Contact Kali Hays at khays@insider.com, on secure messaging app Signal at 949-280-0267, or through Twitter DM at @hayskali. Reach out using a non-work device.
Contact Hugh Langley at hlangley@protonmail.com or on Signal/Telegram at +1-628-228-1836.
