PagerDuty CEO quotes Martin Luther King Jr in layoff email, faces backlash

San Francisco: American cloud computing company PagerDuty has joined the bandwagon of layoffs in the tech industry. However, CEO Jennifer Tejada is facing backlash for quoting civil rights activist Martin Luther King, Jr in an email sent to employees who are being laid off.

Towards the end of the announcement, the said the occasion reminded her of a quote from Martin Luther King Jr - "The ultimate measure of a (leader) is not where (they) stand in the moments of comfort and convenience, but where (they) stand in times of challenge and controversy."

The company announced a 7% layoff in the workforce.

The email is being called the "most tone-deaf layoff email". In the 1,700 mail, she addressed employees as "Dutonians" and referred to layoffs as "refinement". She also used the same email to announce the promotion of some executives and the reduction in spending. She was also criticised for announcing layoffs and celebrating promotions in the same mail.

Many also called it "disgusting" that the mail alternated between corporate jargon for firing people and upbeat remarks about "deeply talented individuals who bring themselves to work". It is being slammed for lack of compassion and empathy.

It was also posted on the company's website.

"We expect to finish the year strong - in fact, we have reaffirmed our guidance for FY23 today - and those results, combined with the refinements outlined above, put PagerDuty in a position of strength to successfully execute on our platform strategy regardless of what the market and the macroenvironment bring," she added.