マスク氏は気まぐれ、「直感」で支配　元ツイッター幹部が批判

【サンフランシスコＡＦＰ＝時事】今週サービス名を「Ｘ」に変更したツイッターの元幹部が２６日、同社のイーロン・マスク会長について、気まぐれに追従する部下に囲まれ、データではなく直感に従って会社を経営していると批判した。（写真は実業家のイーロン・マスク氏〈資料写真〉）
　「Ｘ」への投稿でマスク氏を批判したのは、ツイッターのプロダクトマネジャーを解雇されたエスター・クロフォード氏。同氏は昨年末、ツイッターのオフィスで寝ている写真を投稿し、ＳＮＳで話題となった。
　クロフォード氏は今回の投稿で、「彼（マスク氏）の決定の多くに同意できないし、非常に多くのものを焼き払おうとする姿勢に驚いている。それでも、十分な資金と時間があれば、新しくて革新的なものが生まれるかもしれない」と述べた。
　クロフォード氏はマスク氏がツイッターを買収する前の２０２０年、自らが立ち上げたスタートアップ企業を買収される形でツイッターに加入した。
　「実際のイーロン（・マスク氏）は奇妙なほど魅力的で、本当に面白い」が、「性格や態度が興奮から怒りに変わることがあるのが難点だ」とも述べている。
　クロフォード氏によると、従業員はマスク氏とのミーティングに呼び出されたり、悪い知らせを報告しなければならなかったりすることを恐れていた。「側近たちは彼（マスク氏）の言うことすべてを断固支持し、熱狂的、狂信的だと感じることもあった」という。
　また、「製品やビジネスに関する決定は、ほぼ常に彼（マスク氏）の直感に従った結果であり、決定を下すために多くのデータや専門家の意見を求めたり、頼ったりする必要があるとは思っていないようだった」と批判した。
　さらに、マスク氏は問題解決に取り組む従業員よりも、ＳＮＳ上に投稿されるコメントやツイッター投票を信頼しているようだったとも述べた。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2023/07/28-16:30）

A fired Twitter product manager said Elon Musk ran the company newly renamed X by instinct not data, surrounded by sycophants with his mood changing unpredictably.
Esther Crawford, whose picture sleeping in a Twitter office late last year made her a viral sensation, shared her thoughts on Wednesday in a lengthy post at X.
I disagree with many of his decisions and am surprised by his willingness to burn so much down, but with enough money and time, something new and innovative may emerge, Crawford said in the post.
Crawford joined Twitter when it bought her startup in 2020, before Musk bought the social media platform for $44 billion.
In person Elon is oddly charming and he's genuinely funny, Crawford said.
The challenge is his personality and demeanor can turn on a dime going from excited to angry.
Twitter employees feared being called into meetings with him or having to deliver negative news, according to Crawford.
At times it felt like the inner circle was too zealous and fanatical in their unwavering support of everything he said, Crawford wrote.
Product and business decisions were nearly always the result of him following his gut instinct, and he didn't seem compelled to seek out or rely on a lot of data or expertise to inform it.
Musk seemed to trust random feedback and Twitter polls more than employees working to solve problems at the company, according to Crawford.
His boldness, passion and storytelling is inspiring, but his lack of process and empathy is painful.
Musk has proven success tackling engineering problems, but a social networking platform requires emotional intelligence, Crawford said.
She did not spare the previous management, calling it bloated and soft and entitled where teams could spend months building a feature and then some last-minute kerfuffle meant it'd get killed for being too risky.
Musk killed off the Twitter logo this week, replacing the world-recognized blue bird with a white X.
After buying Twitter, Musk had said that he wanted to create a super-app inspired by China's WeChat, which would function as a social media platform and offer messaging and payments.
Since Musk bought Twitter last October, the platform's advertising business has collapsed as marketers soured on Musk's management style and mass firings at the company that gutted content moderation.
In response, the billionaire has moved toward building a subscriber base and pay model in a search for new revenue.
Many users and advertisers alike have responded adversely to the social media site's new charges for previously free services, its changes to content moderation, and the return of previously banned right-wing accounts.