Fiverr CEO announces cuts with ‘fewer people, more productivity’; Ford reveals HQ move

Greetings, comms pros! Let’s take a look at a few news stories from the past week and see what we can learn from them.

1. Fiverr CEO shares memo on job cuts as company becomes ‘AI-first’

Fiverr founder and CEO Micha Kaufman shared an open memo with his employees on LinkedIn this week, stating that the company was cutting jobs in an effort to move the company into “startup mode.” In the note, Kaufman said that a move to AI and away from people was needed to get the company to its next phase of development — he even subheaded a section of the memo with the phrase “fewer people, more productivity.” The comments section of the memo wasn’t kind to Kaufman, calling him out for being “tone deaf” and “super gross”.

We need to accelerate this mode of work. We can and should dream bigger and build faster, using this moment to build what’s next for Fiverr on a modern, clean, AI-focused infrastructure from the ground up. Our infrastructure was built over the course of many years, and it is not about just adding more people to build on top of it; it is about simplifying it. This is a different skill and a different mindset. It requires going back to startup mode.

Today, we are launching such a transformation for Fiverr, to turn Fiverr into an AI-first company that’s leaner, faster, with a modern AI-focused tech infrastructure, a smaller team, each with substantially greater productivity, and far fewer management layers.

This transformation requires a painful reset, and as we make it, we will be parting ways with approximately 250 team members across the different departments, resulting in a smaller and flatter organization. This is possibly one of the toughest decisions that I have had to make, especially as Fiverr is such a magical place with a strong sense of belonging and mission-driven culture.

Layoff comms aren’t easy — that’s especially true when the news is coming from the top brass. Kaufman does thank the soon-to-be laid-off employees in a few lines at the bottom of the memo and tells them that they’ll be taken care of after the move is finalized, but the focus on AI-tech and not the human impact of the job cuts makes this memo feel a bit imbalanced — especially when Kaufman calls out how important Fiverr’s culture is to its identity.

When you’re working with leadership to construct a layoff memo, keep people at the forefront of it. They’re the ones who make your culture what it is and give your organization an identity. That means communicating with a tone befitting of a move that’s going to displace lots of people who have dedicated time and talent to a role. Be as transparent as you can when sharing the news, and choose words that put the human impact above all else. That’s the sort of leadership comms that get people to rally around the company when there are points of transition. When things aren’t human enough, you might get pushback both internally and externally.

2. Ford tells employees that HQ is moving for the first time in seven decades

American automotive giant Ford told its employees that it’s moving to a new headquarters for the first time since the 1950s. In a letter to workers from executive chairman Bill Ford and CEO Jim Farley said that the move away from its Glass House headquarters to where? was being done in the name of a commitment to employees being able to get their jobs done at the highest level.

Our team is working hard to wrap construction as hundreds of employees are collaborating in the building already. While the majority of the facility will be complete this year, work will continue through 2027 on a final section of the site.

When that’s done, up to 4,000 people can work from our HQ with a total of 14,000 employees within a 15-minute walk of the new World Headquarters building, enabling greater collaboration in practice and proximity.

This is part of a larger investment in our people and our facilities across the globe. We are committed to providing employees with world-class workspaces, modern technology, and the best tools to do their life’s best work—from our global offices to our manufacturing floors. Our dealers around the world are likewise investing in their stores and service centers to elevate the customer experience.

This memo is an interesting case study in change comms. It’s not announcing a layoff or leadership change, but it is walking employees through a change in where they’ll get their jobs done. That’s pretty relevant when your headquarters are in a historic building that’s been the genesis of countless Ford model cars over the years. When you’re a company as old as Ford, people come to identify with their place of work and when you plan on moving, you need to do more than just tell people to go to another building on Monday morning. You need to walk your employees through the reasoning for the change and what’s in it for them. That’ll help keep cultural continuity during the move and might even generate some excitement as Ford seemingly worked to do with this memo.

3. AT&T moves away from employee tracking after pushback 

AT&T is walking back enforcement of its employee tracking system following its announcement of an RTO process this summer. This comes in the wake of both an employee survey that garnered heavy criticism of the tracking system for hybrid employees and a strong counterresponse from CEO John Stankey.

According to Business Insider:

In a meeting last month, chief marketing and growth officer Kellyn Kenny said her division is reducing its reliance on presence tracking in response to employee concerns about the system and its accuracy. The system was originally introduced to identify employees who weren’t showing up in the office.

“We recognize that there’s things about the report that are not correct,” she said, according to audio obtained by Business Insider. “It is not something that I expect anybody to be looking at on a daily, weekly, or even monthly basis.”

AT&T is also deemphasizing use of the tracking system for salaried employees companywide, a person familiar with the matter said.

Business Insider also reported that the employee survey didn’t directly ask about the presence tracking system, it did ask whether or not the company’s policies helped employees do their best work. About half of employees said, prompting Kenny to say, “I now understand the level of anxiety that this report has created. I also now understand how the fact that it is inaccurate is driving people to the brink of frustration, and it’s creating distrust.” 

She added that the policy helped identify people who would swipe in to satisfy the system and then immediately leave. But Business Insider spoke with several AT&T employees who said that the strictness of the policy caused inaccuracies for those who did swipe in a few times a week, leaving them feeling vulnerable about layoffs.

“It was at its worst in March and April,” one worker in New Jersey told Business Insider. “Sometimes you’d step out for lunch, and then it would stop counting.”

The RTO conversation always needs to be hedged within a company’s cultural norms. Culture is built on trust, and when that erodes between employees and leadership it’s tough for communicators to do anything to build it back. Not everyone is going to be jazzed about the RTO process and that’s a given, but when you’re given valuable data like an employee survey, be sure to listen to what it has to tell you. Doing so can be the difference between a much-needed pivot in messaging (or how you communicate a policy) and keeping things the same while culture suffers.

4. How about some good news?

• Researchers found that Mexico’s jaguar population is up 30% from 2010.
• An app is helping reduce food waste and deliver sustenance to people in need.
• A man in Canada had a tooth implanted in his eye — and it restored his vision.
• Ragan Training is great for communications pros to find inspiration and resources.
• You should be rewarded for your work. Find out how to earn an award here!

Have a great weekend comms all-stars!

Sean Devlin is an editor at Ragan Communications. In his spare time he enjoys Philly sports and trivia.