Musk carries a sink into Twitter headquarters during visit ahead of Friday deadline
Elon Musk reportedly reassures Twitter employees concerned about job cuts
Elon Musk arrived at Twitter's San Francisco headquarters on Wednesday. Aside from making a show out the event by bringing a kitchen sink, accompanied by his tweet to "let that sink in," he reportedly told staff news that he would cut 75% of jobs is not true. Musk is facing a Friday deadline to close his $44 billion deal to buy the company.
SAN FRANCISCO - Elon Musk posted a video of himself walking into the Twitter headquarters in San Francisco Wednesday. He wrote in the post "Entering Twitter HQ" followed by "let that sink in" and attached a video of him, literally, carrying a white sink into the lobby.
People passing by said Musk arrived without a large entourage, accompanied by just 3-4 people Wednesday morning.
Musk's visit comes after months of uncertainty over the acquisition. Musk declared his intention to buy the social media company in April, but then tried to back out. That was followed by a battle in the courts, as Twitter's board sued to prevent him from reneging on the $44-billion deal.
Musk appeared to signal his intentions Wednesday, renaming his Twitter account title as "Chief Twit."
Musk posted another tweet at 2:39 p.m. that stated, "Meeting a lot of cool people at Twitter today."
Tweets from Twitter employees also popped up through the day showing Musk at the office.
Musk reportedly told staff that any notion he would cut 75% of the 7,500 employees is not true.
Businesses near the Twitter headquarters along Market Street in San Francisco are hopeful employees will return to the offices and after businesses lost revenue during the pandemic when people were working from home.
The court in Delaware gave Musk a Friday deadline to close the $44 billion dollar deal. Musk has reportedly begun having banks process $13 billion of his payments.
UC Berkeley Professor Dan Moore, at the Haas Business School, is an expert on leadership and confidence. Moore says confidence is a trait that is often associated with corporate leaders.
"Musk is often used as an example of how confidence leads to success, especially among entrepreneurs," said Moore.
Moore says confidence does not always correlate with the successful management of a company. He says Musk's track record shows a risk of overconfidence that could be a detriment to Twitter and his other companies Tesla and Space X.
"Overconfident leaders get their organizations into all sorts of trouble and Musk provides many examples including his poorly conceived tweet about taking Tesla private, having funding lined up. They wound up in an investigation by the SEC," said Moore.
Moore says if Musk does take Twitter private, without a board of directors, the question is who will balance Musk's ego and control of the company.
"When it's management as exemplified with the sort of bold confidence that Elon Musk will bring, there have to be moderating voices within the organization," said Moore, "Wise, responsible leaders with healthy egos...will seek out criticism and doubt themselves when choosing courses of action. Second-guessing whether their initial impulse might be wrong."
Musk is expected to speak with employees again on Friday.