The co-founders of Atlassian, Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar have announced that the company will be saying goodbye to around 500 Atlassians, or 5% of its employees, as part of a restructuring plan aimed at better positioning the company for the long term. The executive team and board made the decision, but the co-founders made the final call. They aim to rebalance the team to prioritize the most critical work, such as ITSM and Cloud.
WHAT TO KNOW
- The company is not reducing its workforce for financial reasons but rather to better support its priorities, such as massive growth opportunities in cloud migrations, ITSM, and serving its enterprise customers in the Cloud.
- Atlassian is offering a separation package, accelerating vesting, providing healthcare benefits, visa support, and internal mobility to those leaving the company. They are also partnering with a third party to provide outplacement services.
- Unlike most companies, Atlassian allows teams to say goodbye, and most people leaving will have the option to interact with their teams until the end of Friday, Mar 10, 2023.
- Those with access to sensitive data will have their laptops locked but can still use Confluence, Slack, Zoom, and Gmail on other enrolled devices. Also atypical in the industry, Atlassian lets those impacted keep their laptops (after remote erase).
- To those leaving, the co-founders expressed their deep regret for the impact this will have on them and their families and hope they will walk into their next phase knowing they’ve had a positive impact on Atlassian.
- To those staying, the co-founders ask that they take the time to process the news and focus on the individual needs of those leaving.
- Atlassian's future remains bright, with much opportunity and possibility ahead.
