Major Reshuffle: Musk’s Signature Move
If there’s one thing you can count on with Elon Musk, it’s his fearless approach to shaking up the ranks—or rather, showing people the door first and asking questions later. True to tradition, a massive restructuring has just hit xAI, Elon Musk’s X subsidiary dedicated to developing the Grok AI. Early this September, more than 500 xAI employees found themselves out of a job, according to Business Insider.
Most of those let go were data annotators, whose job was, quite literally, to “educate” Grok by providing the training data behind the scenes. Not even high-level staff were immune: some found their company access simply cut off overnight.
“After a thorough review of our human data-related activities, we have decided to accelerate the expansion and prioritization of our specialized AI tutors, while reducing our focus on generalist AI tutoring roles. This strategic shift takes effect immediately,” stated the email sent to the laid-off employees. “As part of this change in focus, most generalist AI tutor positions are no longer required, and your contract with xAI will accordingly come to an end.”
From High School to Head of the Team
Even after these cuts, reorganizing such a huge team was no small feat. By mid-September, xAI still had around 1,000 employees. And then came the curveball: xAI put a complete newcomer in charge. Enter Diego Pasini—just 20 years old, a high school graduate in 2023, and, until recently, a student at the University of Pennsylvania. Having joined xAI only in January (fresh off a victory at a company-organized hackathon), Pasini now found himself steering the vast data annotation division, a team that includes both full-time employees and contractors.
Unrest and Uncertainty in the Ranks
Pasini wasted no time stepping into his new responsibilities. In his first days as head of the annotation team, he called an all-hands meeting. According to Business Insider, he reassured staff that the company did not plan any further layoffs. However, reality had other plans—as an additional 100 staff members were let go during the week of September 15th, bringing current staffing down to 900.
Pasini also informed his teams that everyone would soon face individual meetings to present their work and explain their value to xAI. For one employee at least, this triggered “a climate of panic” inside the company. It’s hard to blame them—the prospect of having to justify your very existence on a week’s notice tends to do that.
Youth, Meritocracy, and a Ban on Backtalk
Elon Musk is no stranger to meritocracy—or, at least, he says he isn’t. Musk regularly champions a company culture where skills matter more than seniority. His choice of Diego Pasini fits that mold. Let’s not forget, he’s previously promoted young talents like 24-year-old Luke Farritor into influential roles (Farritor now leads a government efficiency division).
The DOGE team is reportedly packed with nearly half a dozen employees aged 19 to 24, each handpicked by Musk. This approach has sparked debate, but not much of it gets aired publicly at xAI. Employees disagreeing with these rapid promotions? Well, they’d best keep it to themselves: two staffers who criticized Diego Pasini’s meteoric rise on the company’s Slack were locked out of their accounts just a few hours later.
Welcome to xAI: shakeups, surprises, and a culture where even the digital water cooler isn’t entirely safe.
