- James Clayton and Ben Derico
- BBC news
A conference room converted into a bedroom at the Twitter headquarters in San Francisco
The BBC has obtained images of Twitter’s offices converted into bedrooms, which San Francisco authorities are investigating as a possible building code violation.
One of the photos shows a bedroom with a double bed, including a wardrobe and slippers.
A former employee of the company said that the new head of Twitter, Elon Musk, has remained at the headquarters since he bought the company.
And over the past month, Musk has sent out an email to all Twitter employees saying they “have to put in a lot of effort to be successful.”
The San Francisco Department of Building Inspection confirmed it was investigating possible violations after receiving a complaint.
Musk said the city is attacking companies for providing beds to “tired employees.”
Musk posted a now-deleted tweet saying he would work and sleep in the office “until the organization is sorted out.”
The BBC also obtained images of sofas at Twitter headquarters being used as beds.
The images also showed another meeting room with an alarm clock and a picture placed on a prepared bed.
Former employees say the cabinets have been moved to the company headquarters
“It’s like a hotel room,” said one former worker. Employees said Musk regularly sleeps at Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters.
Twitter did not immediately respond to a BBC request for comment.
Over the past month, Musk — who completed his acquisition of Twitter in October — sent an email to every employee at the company saying they needed to work “long hours with high intensity.”
“Only an outstanding performance will constitute a pass mark,” he wrote.
“He’s doing them now,” Scott Weiner, a California senator, told the BBC on Wednesday [العمال] They sleep in the Twitter headquarters.
“It’s clear he doesn’t really care about people. He doesn’t care about the people who work for him.”
“We have to make sure the building is being used for its intended purpose,” a Building Inspection Department official told CBS News.
Two sofas with one bed
Responding to a reporter on Twitter, Musk said the city should prioritize protecting children from the consequences of opioid abuse.
Forbes ran the story, “Unfortunately small conference room sleeps in recently vacated corporate headquarters,” noting that it was a marked improvement over photos of sleeping bags on the floor an employee posted to Twitter.
And Bloomberg reported that there are reports that the bedrooms also house employees of Tesla and other Musk-owned companies who have been brought in to work on Twitter. “Some of them take to Twitter for business meetings,” sources told Bloomberg.
Patrick Hannan, an official with the Department of Building Inspection, told the San Francisco Chronicle that the department has investigated all complaints, noting that there are different rules for apartment buildings, even those used for short stays.
And in May 2020, before Musk’s takeover of the company, Twitter told its employees they could work from home “forever” if they wanted to, because remote work measures during the coronavirus lockdowns had worked.
Musk said last month that remote work would end.
