As two executives step down, Twitter’s new CEO, Parag Agrawal, begins restructuring the company

Jack Dorsey, the co-founder and CEO of Twitter, stood down from his position earlier this week. He named Parag Agrawal, the CTO, as the new CEO, effective immediately. According to an internal email acquired by The Washington Post, Agrawal, who joined Twitter as an engineer in 2011, has already proposed a big restructure of the company. They received confirmation from Twitter as well.

As part of the restructure, Twitter’s Chief Design Officer Dantley Davis, who joined the business in 2019, and Head of Engineering Michael Montano, who started in 2011, have both stepped down.

The New York Times reported in August on Davis’ “tough love” workplace approach, which company officials believed went too far at times. This behaviour appeared to be at odds with Twitter’s #LoveWhereYouWork and #OneTeam slogans, which promote “creating a culture that’s supportive, respectful, and a pretty cool vibe.”

According to a Twitter spokeswoman, “Dantley’s departure is singularly focused around shifting our organisational model around a structure that has one lead manager supporting a key company objective.” “We don’t have further details to share on these changes out of respect for the individuals involved.”

“Parag is focused on operational excellence and setting Twitter up to hit its goals; these changes were made with that in mind. For our teams working within the product and technology organizations, we’re moving to a General Manager model and having one person lead work that supports one of our key company objectives. This will allow us to operate more cross-functionally and enable faster, more informed decision-making,” said a Twitter spokeswoman.

Dorsey was chastised and even sued by a shareholder earlier this year for his multiple CEO duties at Twitter and Square, the fintech behemoth he co-founded. Twitter had been hesitant to innovate in the past, but it has been swiftly adding new features this year, including its subscription Twitter Blue service, Spaces audio rooms, Super Follows, Ticketed Spaces, crypto features, and more. Agrawal has shown an interest in keeping the momentum going at Twitter.

“We’ve recently updated our strategy to hit ambitious goals, and I believe that strategy to be bold and right,” Agrawal wrote in an email to employees on Monday, which he later tweeted. “But our critical challenge is how we work to execute against it and deliver results — that’s how we’ll make Twitter the best it can be for our customers, shareholders and each of you.”

It’s been a week of massive change for both of the firms that Dorsey co-founded. Square launched its rebranding to Block just days after announcing his resignation as CEO of Twitter.