PALO ALTO, Calif. — CEO Steve Westwood of tech juggernaut SnaxR called an emergency all-hands-on-deck meeting to excitedly inform employees of a cool band he discovered and that half of them were fired, investors have reported.
“I know this is last minute, but I have to tell you about this amazing band I caught during my retreat in Big Sur. I was at this artisan distillery bar after six hours of meditation when these guys called Neutral Milk Hotel California hit the stage and induced a spiritual awakening. Like imagine Pixies meets the Beach Boys. The way they merged genres inspired me to merge departments so as of this moment we’re restructuring the company and 45% of you are fired,” said Westwood. “Getting back on track, you all need to check these guys out. I shared a Spotify playlist of their last three albums in the chat, but please do listen on your personal devices as your work laptops have been deactivated.”
Nearly all of the recently terminated employees were shocked but not surprised by Westwood’s actions.
“Normally when Steve calls an ‘all hands’ it’s to sneak a humblebrag about what celebrities he was hanging out with before informing us we’re going to take on more work with no pay increase, but mass layoffs? He could have saved time and fired us via Soundcloud,” said former IT manager Claudia Mills. “The most insulting part is that most of us already know about NMHC because my cousin is the fucking drummer, and honestly they’re just okay. I can’t comprehend how songs about surfing and smoking pot led to him gutting the entire R&D team.”
Management consultants who handle workforce reductions were surprised they weren’t called to handle the controversial layoffs.
“To his team’s credit, they showed a lot of restraint not tearing him limb from limb. Usually when a leader is looking to downsize after saying something completely out of touch with the working class, we handle the firings while they abscond to their second vacation home,” said Blake Sandoval. “It takes a strong stomach to do this job but someone has to deliver the bad news, like when executives decide to outsource Customer Service to Indonesia after tripping on ayahuasca at Burning Man. It’s already happened twice!”
After the meeting, Westwood emailed the laid off staff explaining that severance packages will consist of tickets to any Neutral Milk Hotel California show of their choice.