Rachel Lang
Elon Musk has reportedly directed his new staff at Twitter to work 12 hour shifts and seven days a week in order to hit his aggressive deadlines or they risk losing their jobs.
Speaking to CNBC on the condition of anonymity due to the fear of retribution, Twitter employees who worked at the social media platform prior to the takeover said they have been asked to justify their work, their teams’ work, and their value within the company.
They have been asked to hand over technical documentation to Musk's teams while the threat of a swift sacking looms ever-presently over their heads.
However, Twitter employees told CNBC they have not received direction or plans from Musk yet and feel like they are being kept in the dark about budgets, strategy, and possible job cuts.
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There's also reportedly no information from the top man about whether all this extra work will earn them overtime, time in lieu or job security.
Musk has also reportedly set hectic deadlines for some tasks, which include the pending website redesign of the way Twitter verifies its users with 'blue ticks'.
These anonymous staff have also revealed Musk has enlisted several employee's from his other business ventures to work at Twitter as the tech mogul prepares to do a complete overhaul of the social media platform.
Internal records that were viewed by CNBC show more than 50 employees from Tesla, two from the Boring Company and one from Neuralink have been given the green light to work at the blue bird.
The Boring Company makes underground tunnels while Neuralink focuses on making the concept of digital connections to the human brain a reality.
Insider reported how an internal message sent to the team owning the company's new verification process said: "The expectation is literally to work 24/7 to get this out."
CNBC also reports that a number of Musk's mates, advisors, and financial backers are lending a hand to help revamp the social network.
Managers haven't escaped the long hours either, apparently, with some telling The New York Times that they actually sleep at the Twitter office on Friday and Saturday nights.
The Twitter shakeup comes as the world's richest man finally outlined his plans to charge verified Twitter users to keep their blue tick.
There were initial reports of the monthly fee being as high as $20 a month, however the tech billionaire has revised that down to just $8.
Musk believes having a payment system for a verification badge is the only way to 'beat the bots and trolls'.
He's outlined there will be several benefits for users with the blue tick who agree to fork out a couple of bucks a month.
Those benefits include 'priority in replies, mentions and search, which is essential to defeat spam/scam', ability to post long video and audio, 'half as many ads', and 'paywall bypass for publishers willing to work with us'.
Musk said this new payment system will give Twitter 'a revenue stream to reward content creators'.
He wrote: "Twitter’s current lords & peasants system for who has or doesn’t have a blue checkmark is b******t."
"Power to the people! Blue for $8/month. Price adjusted by country proportionate to purchasing power parity."
However, his bold plan to charge users for that beautiful blue tick could backfire on him as people who already have the verification badge say they won't pay for it.
UNILAD has reached out to Twitter for comment on staff work hours and whether they've been increased in the wake of Musk taking control of the company.