4 takeover lessons from Elon Musk

There have been chaotic takeovers and mergers for as long as takeovers and mergers but rarely have they made headlines like Twitter over the past few months.

Even though the Twitter saga is not the most common one, it is also not a complete anomaly. Similar mistakes have been made in many companies but rarely this many in one go and none this publicly and affecting as many people. The mistakes are pretty obvious, but since similar things keep happening, let’s look into them through what we have learned from the headlines recently.

Lesson 1: Chaos is never a good idea

Most companies don’t have the same problem as Twitter when it comes to publicity around takeovers and mergers, but it seems that Musk has been throwing petrol to the flames instead of trying to manage the damage. When for most companies any headlines for issues around the situation might be forgotten soon by most people, Twitter is like a gift that keeps on giving for journalists looking for headlines. As we can see, there is such a thing as bad publicity and if someone doesn’t learn from this example they can only blame themselves for repeating the mistake. Why would anyone want to see their profit turning into debt this quickly?

By making the hiccups and uncertainty around the sales process so public, Musk has managed to alienate the staff, making many leave without waiting to see what will happen. That is one of the biggest losses in this soap opera but for Musk this must be a gift as this means fewer people to sack. Not a good look either.

A very public change of heart is manna for papers but not for anyone else. A lawsuit is not any better, the only company profiting from a lawsuit is the law firm. No wonder the company’s value keeps sliding down.

Lesson 2: Ignoring and disrespecting staff who kept the product running

“In 2 weeks Twitter has gone from being the most welcoming and healthy workplace I’ve ever known to the most openly hostile and degrading I’ve ever known.”

In addition to making a lot of the staff look for the exit already while he was window shopping, Musk didn’t calm the situation in any way and the staff could watch how this Tesla was just increasing speed while heading towards a wall. Those who stayed to see the impact of the collision didn't get even a hello when he finally brought his sink in. To make things worse, he did plan a staff meeting. Twice. But instead of finally giving answers to the staff, the confusion just continues with last-minute meeting cancellations and people getting fired without any explanations. (Even though at that point it probably wasn’t that much of a surprise to anyone anymore).

He is not the first leader to completely ignore the value of the staff who have been building the company for years, but this time we all were able to follow the scale of rudeness and lack of respect that comes with some CEOs. Even if someone owns a company it is still not only theirs unless they are the only person working there. Seems that money and power make you blind to that at times.

-Elon Musk, 2007

Lesson 3: Risking revenue

By alienating staff, users and advertisers Twitter’s future looks as uncertain as its current state and the past few months. When someone buys a company a common reason is to want to make money with it. However, with his once again erratic behaviour, Musk has made the company’s value go down and the much-needed advertisers want to hold back or run away along with the staff. For anyone wanting to buy a profitable company, it is a good idea to keep it profitable. Unhelpful headlines and decisions that are made without proper planning do not help, a clear idea of the purpose of the purchase and how it is done is crucial. You can’t plan a huge takeover of anything and make things up as you go along. It clearly doesn’t work.

Lesson 4: Uncertain future

To clear the huge debt that was the price tag of this shopping spree, Twitter should get those lost advertisers back asap. So far no one has seemed to be working on turning the direction of the advertiser flow and now even big brands are starting to leave the platform. With the current direction, it will be hard to lure in new users apart from maybe more parody accounts. Now that Twitter is run by the chief Twit, the quick decisions that are clearly either poorly planned or not planned at all, don’t help in calming the situation. They will need all the subscription money they can get, so let’s hope there is still some staff with experience as part of the planning committee. Otherwise, it will be another bullet to Twitter’s own leg. For anyone getting in the middle of this kind of chaos, instead of sacking people with knowledge, use every ounce of it to make improvements.

-Elon Musk

Musk must have understood the problem a long time ago, maybe that is why he changed his mind about the purchase earlier on. This is the point where it’s time to calm things down and bring stability and proper planning to the picture instead of more chaos that will sink the Twitter ship and his sink with it.