Jack Dorsey's Fintech Firm Block Cuts Over 900 Jobs: "Want To Give You Straight Facts"

Block, the financial technology company co-founded by Jack Dorsey, has laid off over 900 people, roughly 8% of the company's staff, on Tuesday, TechCrunch reported. The news was announced to staff in an email from Mr Dorsey himself. In an internal email, he emphasised that the cuts are not financially motivated or aimed at replacing workers with artificial intelligence. Rather, he stated that Block is cutting the roles owing to shifting strategic needs while "raising the bar and acting faster on performance". 

Block owns Cash App and Square. The company provides mobile payments services for consumers, as well as point-of-sale hardware and software for businesses. In the internal email seen by TechCrunch, Mr Dorsey said that the firm is laying off a total of 931 workers - 80 managers, 391 "off strategy" workers and 460 workers who the company believes are underperforming. 

In addition to the layoffs, Mr Dorsey noted that Block is closing 748 open roles at the company, with the exception of those that have progressed to an offer stage, critical operations roles and key leadership roles, among others. He also said that 193 managers are being moved to individual contributor roles. 

In the email, Mr Dorsey stressed the urgency of the reorganisation, stating that the company has been "behind in our actions" and needs to move quickly to stay competitive in a transformative industry moment. The tech entrepreneur also emphasised his commitment to increasing shareholder value and maintaining a "high bar of correctness" in organisational decisions.

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"hi all. today we'll be making some org changes, including eliminating roles and beginning the consultation process in countries where required. i want to give you all the straight facts. as I said at the last Block, there are three areas we'd like to address - strategy: reducing from teams that are off strategy, and fixing our discipline ratios. performance: parting ways with people with a "below" or trending towards "below". (and) hierarchy: driving to flattening our org to a max depth of innercore+4," Mr Dorsey wrote in the mail. 

"none of the above points are trying to hit a specific financial target, replacing folks with AI, or changing our headcount cap. they are specific to our needs around strategy, raising the bar and acting faster on performance, and flattening our org so we can move faster and with less abstraction," he continued. 

Elsewhere in the email, Mr Dorsey stated that "this is the toughest part of my job". "we're working to give clarity to everyone as quickly, with as much context and support, as possible," he said. 

According to TechCrunch, the recent round of layoffs follows a similar restructuring in early 2024, when around 1,000 employees were let go. As of December 2024, the company had around 11,300 staff members worldwide.