Elon Musk has reportedly converted some conference rooms at Twitter’s headquarters into makeshift “bedrooms” this week while pushing a “hardcore” work culture at the social media site.
A photo of one of the rooms obtained by Forbes — which didn’t publish the images and withheld the name of its source over “fear of reprisal” — displayed a queen-sized bed, a wooden bedside table and bright orange carpeting. The beds were purportedly added without any announcement or explanation for employees explaining the move.
Forbes said the rooms held “sleeping quarters reminiscent of sad hotel rooms” and featured “unmade mattresses, drab curtains and giant conference-room telepresence monitors.”
While it’s unclear how many rest areas were added at Twitter’s San Francisco offices, one source said there were roughly “four to eight per floor” and added they “look comfortable.” The source grumbled the onsite beds were “not a good look” for Musk’s company.
“It’s yet another unspoken sign of disrespect. There is no discussion. Just like, beds showed up,” the source said.
A second source told Forbes that the rooms appeared to be mostly empty so far — though they noted that one had signs of use in the form of trash.
“People are already putting in late nights, so it makes sense to an extent,” the source said.
In a separate report, Platformer’s Zoe Schiffer said the library at Twitter’s San Francisco office had also been converted. Schiffer cited a current Twitter employee with knowledge of the matter.
“They described it to me as ‘cozy,’” Schiffer tweeted.
The New York Post has reached out to Twitter for comment on the situation.
The alleged addition of bedrooms is the latest sign of Musk’s effort to overhaul the work culture at Twitter since buying the company for $44 billion. Musk previously laid off roughly half of Twitter’s 7,500-employee global workforce.
Hundreds more employees reportedly departed after Musk warned that Twitter would be shifting to an “extremely hardcore” work schedule that would require late nights at the office. Employees were required to “opt in” to signal they agreed with the approach if they wanted t keep their jobs.
“This will mean working long hours at high intensity,” Musk said in a message at the time, according to the Washington Post. “Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.”
As The Post reported in November, a Twitter employee was photographed appearing to rest in a sleeping bag on the floor of the office while Musk pushed tight deadlines related to his since-halted rollout of the revamped “Twitter Blue” subscription service.
“When your team is pushing round the clock to make deadlines sometimes you #SleepWhereYouWork,” the employee, Esther Crawford, wrote in a tweet sharing the photo.
Meanwhile, Musk’s decision to abrupt order layoffs after completing his Twitter takeover resulted in lawsuits from some jilted ex-employees who accused him of failing to provide proper notice for the pink slips.
[Written in collaboration with other media outlets with information from the following sources]
