Content warning: This story and the videos embedded below contain strong language. Reader discretion is advised.
More than 900 employees at mortgage lender Better.com were let go in a Zoom meeting last week.
The meeting which was recorded and uploaded to TikTok, shows chief executive officer or Better.com – Vishal Garg – dispatching the news in what we’d kindly describe as a distasteful way.
“I come to you with not great news,” Garg opened. “The market has changed, as you know, and we have to move with it in order to survive so that hopefully we can continue to thrive and deliver on a mission. This isn’t news you’re going to want to hear but ultimately it was my decision and I wanted you to hear it from me,” said the CEO.
“It’s been a really really challenging decision to make. This is the second time in my career that I’m doing this and I do not want to do this. The last time I did it I cried ummm this time I hope to be stronger. We are laying off about 15 percent of the company,” Garg added.
You can watch his full statement below but we warn that there is strong language in the video clip below.
@wanderellaco##fyp ##laidoff ##savage♬ original sound – Wanderella
The CEO cited job performance, productivity and the market as reason for the decision to lay-off 15 percent of his firm.
The good news in this scorched Earth policy is that employees will get a month’s pay and three months in benefits but Garg’s decision here has been met with vitriol.
For one, Better.com received $750 million cash injection from Softbank just last week and has plans to go public. However, one employee who was let go alleges that this mass firing was done because the firm is need of capital. We can’t speak to the truth of this statement but it would be worrying if that was indeed the case.
“I thought I was safe. I had perfect reviews and thought I was an integral part of the team. It’s a bummer, because I know I worked really hard to help build up that company, and it looks like I just wasted my time,” one worker who was let go told NBC News.
But Garg seems to have a habit of being a bit of a brash CEO.
In an email obtained by Forbes in 2020, the CEO told employees they were a “bunch of DUMB DOLPHINS” who were embarrassing him.
In that report many of Garg’s less savoury business practices were put on display including a lawsuit in which Garg or his entities were accused of fraud and worse.
We are curious to see what spurred this mass firing on and, as a former employee alleges, whether Better is in trouble financially.
While firms usually have reasons for letting employees go, doing so in such large numbers before firms close up shop for the festive season is callous and uncaring.
Activision Blizzard has also just fired quality assurance testers who worked on Call of Duty games despite making over $2 billion in revenue over three months it reported in November.
We really need a better crop of CEOs going into 2022.
[Image – CC 0 Pixabay]
