Have I been fired? Worker asks CEO Elon Musk on Twitter

A Twitter employee pleaded with Elon Musk on the platform to ask if he had been fired.

In a tweet to the company’s CEO, Thorlevson said, “Your Head of HR is unable to confirm whether or not you are employed.”

Mr. Musk responded by asking, “What work have you been doing?”

Hallie Thorlevson told the BBC that nine days after she was suspended from her Twitter accounts, he did not know if he had been fired.

After a series of questions and answers with Mr. Musk, which reads like a live interview for his job, Mr. Thorlevson said he received an email confirming he had been fired.

Twitter immediately responded to the BBC’s request for comment.

Mr. Thorleifsson, 45, was a senior manager in product design for Twitter. He told the BBC that the mystery of his job was “strange” and “very stressful”.

“I opened my computer on Sunday morning nine days ago and saw the screen was gray and locked, indicating that I had locked my Twitter accounts,” he said.

“After a few days had passed, I started reaching out to people, including Elon and the head of HR to ask about my status.

“Since then, my HR manager has emailed me twice and hasn’t been able to answer whether or not I’m a Twitter employee.”

Frustrated, his main boss, Elon Musk, tweeted.

“Maybe if enough people retweet you’ll answer me here,” Mr. Thorlevson.

After several follow-up questions, Mr. Thorlevson gave a list of things he had done in the company. The exchange ended with Mr. Musk posting two laughing emojis.

Shortly after that exchange, Mr. Thorlevson said he was contacted by Twitter’s human resources department to say he had been fired.

The Iceland-based entrepreneur sold his company, Ueno, a creative design agency, to Twitter in early 2021 — after establishing the company in Reykjavík in 2014.

As part of the acquisition, he became a full-time employee at Twitter.

He told the BBC: “I decided to sell for several reasons, one of which is that I suffer from muscular dystrophy and my body is slowly but surely failing me.”

“I had a few years of good work left in me, so this was a way to wrap up my company, and prepare myself and my family for years when I wouldn’t be able to do as much.”

Mr. Thorleifsson is concerned that Mr. Musk will not honor the contract he signed with Twitter when he sold his company to them.

“This is very stressful. This is my retirement fund, a way to take care of myself and my family as my disease progresses. Having the richest man in the world on the other end of this, perhaps refusing to be bound by contracts, is not an easy thing for me to accept.”

Last month, it appeared that Elon Musk fired 200 more Twitter employees. This means that Twitter now has just over 2,000 workers – down from about 7,500 in October.

“Companies let people go, and it’s their right,” Thorlefson said. “Usually they tell people about it but that seems to be the optional part of Twitter now.”