Netflix employee confidence wanes amid layoffs as former employees say company culture is changing

A few months ago, Netflix began circulating an internal Google document containing changes to the company’s culture memo. The document received around 10,000 comments from employees before the final product, posted on the Netflix Jobs website, was released to the public in early May.

The comments included a guideline for employees to “spend [Netflix] Money Wisely Members” and a reminder that leaders must also be responsible for protecting company values. But there was a section, called “On Artistic Expression”, which stood out to some collaborators.

“Not everyone will like or agree with everything in our service,” the note reads. It ends with a message aimed directly at employees: “Depending on your role, you may need to work in titles that you find harmful. If you find the breadth of its content difficult to digest, Netflix may not be the place for you.”

The updated record appeared to be a direct response to the public and national outcry against the streaming giant last October. Near, Dave Chapelle’s comedy special, which included many transphobic jokes. While Netflix received a great response from the public, CEO Ted Sarandos acknowledged that “brokeIn its initial responses to employee concerns at the time, Streamer announced a deal with Chapel. Four more comedy specials And he has taken a tougher line on what he sees as “artistic freedom,” even at the expense of his own employees, as part of his company’s culture.

“Talking about what’s best for business in 2021 was still part of the culture,” said a former Netflix employee. the hollywood reporter. “Upon re-subscribing…Netflix revealed that the new order is ‘If you don’t like it, leave’.”

While most organizations today typically have a values ​​document, Netflix rose to prominence in 2009 when CEO Reed Hastings publicly announced the company’s management approach in the form of a 125-slide deck that included a seemingly radical concept at the time. vacation and. “Avoid the rules.” The deck, which has since become an official cultural memo, has been a source of inspiration behind Hastings’ 2020 book. Rules without rules.

But this month’s memo change comes at a time of great turmoil for Netflix, which is battling slowing subscriber growth as competitors like Disney put a streamer around their necks. In the first quarter of the year, Netflix lost 200,000 subscribers and expects to lose another 2 million in the second quarter, a loss that has ruined the company’s stock and worried employees and investors about the future of high-end and high-end flights. increase. – Expense transmitter. To avoid these losses, Netflix launched Experiments in new areas of business such as advertising and video games, the first of which Hastings strongly opposed.

But like any company trying to cut costs, Netflix is ​​cutting costs and implementing Two rounds of major layoffs in a month, the most recent round cutting 150 full-time employees, or about 2% of the company’s total workforce, and several dozen contractors working in Netflix’s editorial department, some of them newly recruited. hired. Months ago and specifically worked on channels dedicated to underrepresented identities like Strong Black Lead, Con Todo, Most and Netflix Golden.

All social channels are hosted by Netflix’s marketing department and aim to enhance Netflix programming that targets a specific audience and builds strong communities with viewers. Strong Black Lead, for example, was launched in 2018 as a Netflix programming promotion tool that showcases black talent and creators and builds a meaningful community with black audiences throughout the year. Since then, the marketing brand has released original video series, podcasts and has amassed 804,000 subscribers on Instagram and over 253,000 subscribers on Twitter.

Following this success, Netflix’s marketing team continued to roll out additional channels, such as Con Todo, to Latino communities; Most for LGBTQ+ audiences; And more recently gold, for the Asian diaspora. Each of these channels has several thousand followers on Instagram and Twitter.

Netflix said the editorial cuts made across all social channels, not just identity-focused, are part of a broader strategy to create social content in-house rather than by third parties. The company also laid off several employees in the final round of layoffs in the family and animation departments and abandoned ongoing animation projects for Ava DuVernay and Megan MarkleNetflix, however, said the series was canceled for creative reasons.

“We are making changes to the way we support our publishing efforts, including internally appealing this important work,” said a Netflix spokesperson. “Our social channels continue to grow and innovate, and we are investing heavily in them.

While the social media accounts are still up and running, the laid-off editors question Netflix’s commitment to diversity, as most of the hires said they were incentivized to join Netflix because it focuses on supporting writers, editors and contributors from a variety of backgrounds.

In addition to promoting identity-focused social channels, Netflix reaffirmed its commitment to commit to recent financial pledges, including a $100 million or 2% equity transfer to banks that support communities of color and a $100 raise. 5 million. Invest in black startups and businesses. Streamer also focused on improving the diversity of its own team; Last year, Netflix said that women make up half of its global workforce, while about half of its US workforce was the global majority, according to the company’s 2021 Diversity Report.

“There’s been a lot of talk about how Netflix has committed to diversity and inclusion, and I think a lot of us that we’ve brought in really believe that,” said Netflix, a former editorial staffer affected by the recent round of layoffs. . . “Writers really create a lot of amazing content that you see on these channels and [bring] Really broad and varied perspectives, so it’s a shame we all got laid off. ”

It didn’t help either, according to two contractors who spoke THR, The two rounds of dismissal came with very little comment. (Netflix hires are hired by outside agencies, and at least one agency, Made by Fabric, appears to have gone completely bankrupt after the latest round of layoffs.)

“They need to reinvent themselves,” added the third member of Netflix’s editorial staff, who was fired in April. “It’s just a corporate thing [where] Someone high up who makes, you know, $10 or $20 million a year makes a bad decision or stops dealing with a problem and people on the ground have to suffer for it. This is really disgusting. ”

That’s not to say being fired or fired from Netflix is ​​particularly unusual for a streamer who has a specific “gatekeeper test” guiding the company’s approach to firing. “If a team member went to a similar position at another company, would the manager try to keep them? He in the Culture Memorandum).

But when the final round of layoffs was determined by “business needs rather than individual performance,” as a Netflix spokesperson said at the time, employees noticed a loss of employee confidence. “It feels like they’ve really lost control of the story, like it’s out of control,” added another Netflix source. “Trust has been broken.”

As for how Netflix will handle future staff disagreements, an updated memo on “artistic expression” in the sequel to Ricky Javers’ new comedy, which includes plenty of jokes about trans women, is also being discussed. Netflix did not respond to a repeated request for comment on the Jersey special, and if the company’s accusation of Chappelle’s specialty is any indication, the Streamer will likely revert to backing the comedian.

“It was part of the culture and people thought that gave them the right to speak. “The new cultural memo shows that the creative is now protected from hearing opinions they don’t agree with,” said the first former Netflix employee. “It’s a shame, because if they don’t listen to officials who are related to the minority and don’t monitor viewer activity through that lens, they’re operating in a cultural black box.”