Twitter’s CEO Jack Dorsey disclosed that almost half of Twitter’s senior managers are jumping ship, as the former #3 social media darling has fallen to #8 and monthly average users shrank by about 8 million since the end of October.
Obama bundler Chris Sacca led the June board of directors’ coup that fired popular CEO Dick Costolo. Sacca claimed Costolo had to go because Twitter’s monthly average-user (MAU) growth had been cut in half to 14 percent, causing the stock to fall by $4 billion over the preceding year. But since Costolo was dumped, Twitter has actually experienced negative growth and the stock price is down another $13 billion.
Founder Dorsey, who was made permanent CEO in October, said on Twitter that the January 24 departures of four of his ten top managers was voluntary. His only regret, “Was really hoping to talk to Twitter employees about this later this week, but want to set the record straight now.”
Dorsey tried spinning the loss by adding, “All four will be taking some well-deserved time off. I’m personally grateful to each of them for everything they’ve contributed too Twitter and our purpose in the world.”
But after being abandoned by its top engineering executive Alex Roetter, top products executive Kevin Weil, chief human resources officer Skip Schipper, and media partnership leader Katie Jacobs Stanton, it looks like Twitter’s leaking ship is sinking fast.
The loss of Stanton, who leads media partnerships in a U.S. presidential election year, is especially traumatic. She had been lauded over her five-and-a-half-year tenure for opening Twitter offices around the world that specialized in first-mover politics. Stanton was credited with trying to make Twitter more viral by advocating for a new feature called “Moments” that compiles photos, video and messages about big news events.
Whether because he is trying to save money, or unable to attract talent, Dorsey announced on Twitter that he is turning over human resources and the media teams to Twitter’s chief operating officer, Adam Bain, and engineering to chief technology officer Adam Messinger.
The executive departures follow Dorsey’s dumping of 300 of the company’s 3,700 employees in October in an effort he described as addressing the board’s concerns that the company had not turned a profit after nearly a decade of operations.
But as if the turmoil at Twitter were not enough of a full-time job for a CEO, Dorsey took his other company named Square public in mid-November. Although Square stock popped on the first day of trading by 45 percent, it has fallen back by 30 percent in the last 60 days after reporting bigger quarterly losses, just like Twitter.
Speculation about witter’s future plans are swirling. Wired magazine reported that Dorsey is expected to make numerous personnel changes in the coming weeks, and Recode reported that Twitter is close to naming a new chief marketing officer.
Twitter has not responded to any media requests for comments about its future plans.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.