It seems that turbulent times don’t stop on Twitter.
After announcing a massive downsizing, the remaining employees at the technology company bought by Elon Musk have received a message warning them that the company’s office buildings will be temporarily closed.
The closure will take effect immediately.
In a communication seen by the BBC, the workers were told that the offices they would reopen on Monday, November 21.
Twitter did not give any reason for this decision.
Friday’s announcement comes amid reports that large numbers of staff were quitting their jobs when Musk asked his employees to prepare to work long hours at “high intensity” or leave of the company.
The message ends by saying: “Please continue to comply with company policy by refraining from discussing confidential information on social media, with the press or anywhere else.”
Twitter did not immediately respond to a BBC request for comment.
reactions to Musk’s new policies
This week, Musk told Twitter staff that they had to commit to working long hours and that “they would have to be extremely tough” or leave the company, according to reports.
In an email to staff, the new owner of the social network said workers should accept that commitment if they wanted to stay, reported the Washington Post.
Those who had not signed up to that new policy by Thursday, November 17 would receive three months severance payMusk said.
Earlier this month, the company said that cut outlaugh around 50% of its workforce.
According to reports, a large number of workers have resigned because have not accepted the new terms de Musk.
Employees have been tweeting with the hashtag #LoveWhereYouWorked (#AmaTuLugarDeTrabajo) and a greeting emoji to show that they were leaving the company.
A former Twitter worker who wished to remain anonymous told the BBC: “I think when the dust settles today, probably less than 2,000 people will remain” working in the company.
“The team manager was fired. And then that manager’s manager was fired. The person above him was one of the executives fired on the first day. So there’s no one left in the chain of command.”
Before Musk took control of Twitter, the company it had about 7,500 employees.
The company was also reported to have employed thousands of contract workers, most of whom are believed to have been laid off.
Another person said that he had resigned even though she was prepared to work long hours.
“I didn’t want to work for someone who he threatened us by email several times saying that ‘only exceptional tweeters should work here’ when I was already working 60-70 hour weeks,” he said.
The richest person in the world became CEO of Twitter after buy the company last month for $44,000 millions.
In response to a question about concerns that Twitter was about to shut down after the Twitter office closure message was sent, Musk tweeted:
“The best people are staying, so I’m not worried at all“.
In separate posts, he tweeted a skull and crossbones emoji and a meme showing a tombstone with the Twitter logo.
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