The Twitter profile page belonging to Elon Musk is seen on an Apple iPhone cell phone.
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After Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk took ownership of Twitter last week, the social networking giant launched into a steep reduction in its workforce. The cuts affected a complete of 983 employees in California, its home state, in line with three letters of notice that the corporate sent to regional authorities, which were obtained by CNBC.
The corporate’s latest owner, CEO and sole director Musk, wrote in a tweet on Friday afternoon, “Regarding Twitter’s reduction in force, unfortunately there isn’t any selection when the corporate is losing over $4M/day. Everyone exited was offered 3 months of severance, which is 50% greater than legally required.”
Twitter’s reduction in force prolonged beyond California, and CNBC couldn’t immediately confirm whether Musk’s description is accurate. A lack of $4 million per day at the corporate would represent an annual loss around $1.5 billion.
The federal Employee Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act requires employers to supply advance notice, generally inside 60 days, of mass layoffs or plant closings in California.
In response to the letters from Twitter, shared by the California Employment Development Department, Twitter notified affected employees on Nov. 4. A lot of those staff described losing access to email, and other internal systems at Twitter, overnight on Nov. 3 in public posts on social media, including on Twitter itself.
This type of arrangement may function “payment in lieu of notice,” in California depending on specific terms of employment. Everlasting terminations are expected to start Jan. 2023, in line with the WARN notices.
In three different California WARN notice letters, signed by the Twitter Human Resources Department but no individual executives, the corporate wrote: “Affected employees might be paid all wages and other advantages to which they’re entitled through their date of termination.”
In response to the WARN notice, Twitter cut roughly 784 staff in San Francisco, including nine executive and senior level officials or managers, 147 mid-level employees who typically reported on to top execs, 592 other professionals and 36 sales and administrative support staff combined.
At the corporate’s satellite locations in Santa Monica, Twitter cut roughly 93 employees including 17 mid-level officials and managers, 66 professionals and 10 combined sales and administrative support staff, the WARN notice showed.
At a San Jose office, Twitter cut roughly 106 employees, including one executive or senior-level official or manager, 18 mid-level officials and managers, 85 professionals and two administrative support staff, in line with the WARN notice.
Twitter was sued Thursday by former employees in a proposed class motion filed by employee’s rights attorney Shannon Liss Riordan and others who were concerned that employees weren’t given proper notice, under federal and California law, that they’d be terminated within the mass layoffs.
Shannon Liss-Riordan, a employee’s rights attorney representing the terminated Twitter employees, didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment.