Twitter’s new chief executive and former chief technology officer, Parag Agrawal, announced a major reorganization of the company Friday, putting his stamp on the organization following the sudden departure of co-founder and CEO Jack Dorsey earlier this week.
The shake-up will bring together employees previously divided by job function — such as engineering, design and product development — on teams organized by what they’re working on, such as consumer product, revenue and core tech.
In a companywide email, Agrawal said that he will focus on “clear decision-making, increased accountability, and faster execution,” and added he was “making a number of organizational and leadership changes to best position us to achieve our goals. … We’ve all discussed the critical need for more operational rigor and it must start from the top.”
The reorganization is the first clear sign that Twitter’s new leader intends to overhaul a culture that has been considered slow to innovate and face internal conflict.
Dorsey, who announced his resignation from Twitter unexpectedly on Monday, was viewed by many as a hands-off leader. He had faced pressure to resign from investors and was criticized, along with the leaders of other social media companies, for failing to control the spread of misinformation and other harmful content.
Agrawal, 37, was chosen unanimously to succeed Dorsey by Twitter’s board of directors. He has an engineering background and rose through the ranks over a decade at Twitter. He is tasked with making Twitter a faster-paced company but will also face intense scrutiny from lawmakers intent on regulating social media.
Dorsey will continue to
remain CEO of Square, which he renamed Block this week to highlight a focus on
cryptocurrency. Despite his absences, he was known as a charismatic and
visionary leader who represented the company during years of controversies over
bullying and harassment. He was the first leader of a tech company to limit the
speech of President Donald Trump when the company slapped a warning label over
his tweets last year.
From The WashingtonPost (edited)
