Elon Musk works sixteen hours a day. He never takes a vacation. A few hours of sleep can only be achieved with sleeping pills. He himself does not know why Musk works as much as he works, he told me two weeks ago a video interview at a conference for managers in Bali. “The extent to which I torture myself is next level.”
If Musk has been sleeping in recent weeks, he does so at Twitter’s headquarters in San Francisco – the company that Musk acquired a month ago for $ 44 billion. He wants to “repair the organization” there, as he says. It fits Musk’s leadership style: being present and leading by example. The CEO then expects his staff to work as obsessively as he does.
Since Musk bought Twitter, he has shaken up the social media company with his unorthodox management style. Musk fired the entire top of Twitter a few hours after his entrance and sent 3,750 employees away after two weeks, half of the total. That turned out to be too rigorous; he then rehired some of them. He surrounded himself with confidants and introduced a corporate culture at Twitter that he describes as “extremely hardcore”. Those who don’t want to work hard can leave.
Is this the way as a top executive to breathe new life into a dormant, loss-making company like Twitter? NRC asked three experts to analyze Musk’s management style based on five events in his first month at Twitter.
1. The entrance
Let that sink in
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Illustration Khattar Shaheen
It is Wednesday morning, October 26, as Elon Musk with a porcelain sink (sink) walks into Twitter headquarters in San Francisco in his arms. „Let that sink in!” he tweeted. It is his first act as CEO of the company.
Musk has been trying to get his hands on Twitter for the past nine months. When he finally succeeds, with a lot of borrowed money, he has to get the social medium profitable quickly. In 2021, it suffered a $221 million loss on $5 billion in revenue. He takes the company off the stock exchange and can then make all decisions without any form of control or countervailing power.
Erik de Haan, professor of organizational development at the Free University in Amsterdam: “In English they say”Throw the kitchen sink at it‘, which means something like going to extremes. When I saw that he had a wash basin and no sink with him, I knew, no, that was unfortunately not what he meant. He shows with that moment: there is only one boss here and that is me. It’s a dictator’s way in.”
Quintin Schevernels, former CEO of tech companies Funda and Layar and expert in the field of innovation and growth: “I think the moment with the sink is really authentic Musk. There’s nothing fake about it. It is completely his way of humor, with which he also immediately creates something on social media. In doing so, he mainly shows: here I am.”
Annet Aris, supervisory director at Randstad and ASML and professor of digital transformation at the French Insead: “With Twitter, Musk is buying a company that already brought culture and people, unlike his other companies, which he built from the ground up. Then he can do two things: look at things or adjust everything. He chooses the latter and propagates it from the very first moment. Musk wants to make a statement here.”
2. The first decision
The top has to leave
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Illustration Khattar Shaheen
Musk’s first big decision at Twitter comes a few hours after the sink moment. He fires chief executive Parag Agrawal, chief financial officer Ned Segal and head of legal affairs Vijaya Gadde. Musk replaces the top with friends and confidants. These men are mostly from one of his other companies or are friends from the investment world.
Schevernels: “Musk makes it a crisis situation. The way he looks at it is: Twitter was a lazy company where people were spoiled and where the CEO ignored Twitter’s problems. The potential was not fulfilled. Many people let it ripple along in such a situation, but that’s not Musk’s style. When he tackles something, he does it 300 percent.”
The problem with successful leaders: they always have a dark side. They go overtime, throw tantrums
Eric de Haan professor of organizational development at the VU University in Amsterdam
Aris: Musk clearly has no faith in Twitter’s current leadership. He thinks the company will continue to muddle through if the organization does not change. So he gathers people around him who are capable of giving an organization a whip. It doesn’t surprise me that they are people who know little about social media. He clearly assumes that running Twitter isn’t as complex as running Tesla or SpaceX. He may be right about that.”
Rooster: “The problem with successful leaders: they always have a dark side. They go overtime, throw tantrums. The best way to prevent this is to organize countervailing power. I’m afraid this club is mostly made up of people who don’t contradict him. What Musk does is shock therapy. But that only works if it comes from a coalition that can also give Mr Musk shock therapy from time to time.”
Also read this profile of the man who buys Twitter: The Seven Faces of Elon Musk
3. The round of layoffs
Half must go
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Illustration Khattar Shaheen
Elon Musk is in charge for ten days when Twitter announces a round of layoffs. Half of the 7,500 employees will lose their jobs. The email containing the news is signed by “Twitter,” not Musk himself.
Employees in the non-technical departments are particularly affected: marketing, moderation and communication. The morning after the announcement, some employees already notice that they can no longer enter the systems.
Soon after the round of layoffs, it becomes clear that Twitter has let too many people leave. Daily work is in jeopardy. As a result, the company is forced to re-hire some of the laid-off workers.
Schevernels: “Musk clearly does not have a positive image of the people, the culture and the productivity. Then in the first three or four weeks you will make it clear how you want it to be. If that means cleaning: so be it. Musk immediately makes a clear choice here: Twitter must primarily be a company for engineers [technisch onderlegd personeel, vooral programmeurs]. The layoffs are collateral damage for him, necessary to reduce costs and change the culture. And if some people have to come back left and right, he makes some calls himself or pulls out the wallet.”
Aris: “What was the main reason for buying Twitter? For Musk, that was the users, the data, and the algorithms. All those non-technical departments are easily replaceable in the current rounds of layoffs in Silicon Valley. It is precisely there that he wants the new people to propagate his culture and ambition. By firing many people, he hopes to have employees who will go through fire for him. It is not customary and not wise for staff to return after a round of layoffs. Those who come back are not there in their hearts.”
Rooster: “Firing someone and then asking back is not wrong in itself. It is always better to reverse a wrong decision quickly. Although I dare to assume that Musk could have known this in advance if he had gathered more people involved with whom he communicates openly. People shutting down systems can sometimes be for good reason. But it is much more often a sign of fearful and authoritarian – and therefore ineffective – leadership.”
4. The response to criticism
Fired immediately
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Illustration Khattar Shaheen
Although Musk calls himself a fighter for freedom of expression, he fires employees who contradict him. Twitter employee Eric Frohnhoefer gets even in public his resignation via Twitter after criticizing his boss on the medium. Another employee has to leave after contradicting Musk in the workplace.
Rooster: “These examples once again show that Musk does not tolerate contradiction, while the company needs it right now. We’ve been able to see from Musk’s tweets for years what happens when you challenge or contradict him. There is no listening response, as befits a good leader. This is a clearly derailed authoritarian leader.”
Musk is a typical example of someone who has been proven right so many times that he has come to rely on his own right
Quintin Schevernels former CEO Funda and Layar
Aris: “Musk clearly wants to bring back the start-up mentality. If you try something new and you have all kinds of people trying to stop it, it’s not going to work. I do understand that he is quickly trying to get rid of people who do not believe in him and are not willing to go for his vision.”
Schevernels: “Musk is a typical example of someone who has been proven right so many times that he has come to rely on his own right. That’s a weakness. But if someone is going to express public criticism, then I understand that you can fire someone with immediate effect. If you don’t like it, why don’t you go somewhere else? Look at Cristiano Ronaldo who dropped the trainer in an interview, who has to leave Manchester United now, right? You don’t hear anyone about that, do you?”
5. The new culture
Extremely hard work
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Illustration Khattar Shaheen
It will be two weeks before Musk makes his first announcement to all his employees. “sorry it took so long” emails he to the workplace on Wednesday 9 November. “But there is no way to deliver this message kindly.”
What follows: a story about Twitter’s dire economic situation. To become successful as a company, everyone will have to work “hard,” Musk said. That includes: abolishing Twitter’s work from home policy. Under Musk, everyone has to be in the office again for forty hours a week, with a few exceptions.
Follows a week later a new email. Twitter’s new work culture will be “extremely hardcore with long hours and high intensity,” Musk writes. Those who want to participate must click the ‘yes’ button at the bottom of Musk’s email within 24 hours. If you do not respond, await departure and three months of severance pay.
Rooster: “This leadership style is unfortunately exemplary for tech companies. We see a combination of impressive technical innovation with an extremely primitive conception of leadership. Musk thinks he can make people more productive by suppressing them. In doing so, he makes his employees an extension of his power. It does not work. Employees will only think along constructively if you stimulate and motivate them.”
Aris: “Look, it is of course terrible what he does. If you want to destroy a company’s trust and culture, this is the way to go. But still, he clearly does this very consciously. He wants to shake up Twitter. To be clear: I personally do not find his approach and methods acceptable. With Musk in charge, it’s all or nothing. Without that enormous appetite for risk, he would never have gotten Tesla off the ground or built SpaceX’s rockets.”
Schevernels: “A round of layoffs such as Musk is implementing is a way of knowing: who are we really going to do this with? Who is willing to go very far? This is how you implement a huge culture change. As much as I admire him as an entrepreneur, this is a style that would make me very unhappy. It is so incredibly disrespectful to a large group of people. I understand what he is doing in terms of content, but that tone. Does it really have to be like this?”