Former Twitter executive who slept at his desk warned of burnout

The photo went viral and became, for better or worse, emblematic of the work culture — and chaos — that had taken over Twitter under its new boss.

“I love my family and I’m grateful that they understand that there are times when I have to go into overdrive to grind and push to deliver. Building new things at the scale of Twitter is very hard to do. I’m lucky to be doing this work alongside some of the best people in tech,” Crawford tweeted after receiving backlash for the photo.

But behind the scenes, the Twitter executive expressed concern about her employees burning out under the pressure of Musk’s demands and tight deadlines.

In addition, the photo was staged.

Pushing the team to death

According to a story adapted from “Character Limit: How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter,” an upcoming book about Musk’s chaotic takeover of the company by New York Times reporters Kate Conger and Ryan Mac, Crawford expressed concern to Musk about how her team was pushed to turn Twitter Blue into a service that would hand out blue checks to any user who paid $8 a month. Previously, verifications were used to check celebrities, government entities and other notable users susceptible to impersonators. The old Twitter Blue offered users more features, such as the ability to edit tweets.

Three sources familiar with Crawford’s conversations with Musk told Times reporters that the Twitter executive was given 10 days to relaunch Blue.

It seems that this pressure has had an impact on some members of the team.

According to the excerpt, some employees working at Blue began monitoring their increased heart rates on their Apple watches and sharing the stats with their colleagues as a lighthearted joke.

At one point, Crawford, who had to devise careful tactics for approaching Musk, told the new boss that he didn’t want to push his team to death.

“I don’t want to push the team to die because of this,” Crawford told Musk, according to the excerpt.

“Well, push them right before they die,” Musk said, laughing.

Crawford and a spokesman for X did not respond to a request for comment.

A loyal employee of Musk

Crawford joined Twitter in 2020 and stayed from Musk’s takeover until she was fired.

It’s unclear why Crawford was let go, despite being one of Musk’s most loyal employees. In February 2023, the director was of at least 50 team members who were FIRED. The company was renamed X in July 2023.

The former filmmaker had said on social media that she embraced Musk’s culture of hustle and that before he came on board, “Twitter often felt like a place that kept wasting its own potential.” But she also said Musk put himself in an “echo chamber” by surrounding himself with “yes men.”

According to the book, Crawford brought a sleeping bag and an eye mask to the office for naps. One of her colleagues had even taken a photo of her sleeping at work.

Crawford and her colleagues later decided to take another photo of her in the sleeping bag — this time, on stage — after working a long shift with the crew.

The tweet of the staged photo quickly spread across the internet, receiving both praise and criticism.

According to the book, the colleague who took the photo wanted to take the post down, but Crawford insisted on keeping it up.

“We are #OneTeam and use the hashtag #LoveWhereYouWork to show it, which is why I retweeted with #SleepWhereYouWork — a tiresome nod to fellow Tweeps,” Crawford wrote at the time. “We’ve been in the middle of a crazy public procurement for months, but we’re going forward and I’m so proud of our strength and resilience.”

In April, Crawford announced he was joining Meta and praised CEO Mark Zuckerberg for his “vision and intensity.” Crawford took on a similar role he held at Twitter, becoming Meta’s director of product management.

“Seeing how he’s made the company more efficient and less bureaucratic over the past year makes me even more inclined to join now because I want to move fast and deliver great products,” Crawford said of Zuckerberg.