Better.com, a digital mortgage firm, dismissed around 900 employees in a single Zoom session arranged only weeks before Christmas.
“If you’re on this call, you are part of the unlucky group that is being laid off,” said the company CEO Vishal Garg during a call last Wednesday.
“Your employment here is terminated effective immediately,” he said, according to a recording of the call uploaded on social media.
Market efficiency, performance of employees, and productivity, according to Garg, were the reasons for the mass layoffs of 15% of the company’s workers.
“This is the second time in my career I’m doing this… the last I did it, I cried,” he said.
Better.com announced plans to go public in May, but the deal was delayed.
The company and its CEO were widely criticized for what many said was an “insensitive,” “heartless” or “harsh,” move.
