The Better.com CEO realized he had done something wrong.
The barrage of negative publicity wasn't enough to show that.
Garg apologized for the way he handled the layoffs last week in a letter leaked today. I made a mistake in communicating the decision to do the layoffs. I embarrassed you.
Some might argue that he embarrassed himself. Multiple sources say that the company's diversity & inclusion team was among the affected employees.
Sources familiar with internal affairs within the company told TechCrunch that the company's VP of communications, Patrick Lenihan; head of public relations, Tanya Gillogley; and head of marketing, Melanie Hahn, have all submitted their resignations. Earlier today, Insider reported that news.
The way in which Garg handled the layoffs of about 900 people has caused a lot of backlash, including accusations of insincerity on Garg's part. People all over the world trashed Garg's actions in the video.
The move last week came after the digital mortgage lender announced it had received a cash injection of about $750 million as an amendment of its SPAC agreement with blank check company Aurora Acquisition Corp., and SoftBank, and then promptly laid off about 9% of its 10,000 workforce. The company is expected to go public.
The company is pushing back the closing of its SPAC, which was supposed to happen in the fourth quarter of this year.
Garg confirmed to Fortune this week that the company accused at least 25 employees of stealing from the company and customers by working just two hours a day. He addressed the company in a town hall after Garg announced the layoffs. According to a leaked recording of the meeting, he laid out a vision of a leaner, meaner, hungrier workforce.
At the time of writing, Better.com has not yet responded to the comment that was reached out to them. The employees who resigned did not respond to requests for comment.
Better.com is one of the proptechs that has seen top executives leave in advance of its public debut. Insider reported that more than a dozen of WeWork's top officials had left the company amid reports of internal complaints and uncertainty surrounding its IPO plans.
Will investors and board members tolerate this sort of behavior from Garg, or will he be forced out, like Adam Neumann?
Forbes revealed the contents of an email that Garg sent to his employees last year, which was described as a not very nice person. You are too slow. You are a bunch of dolphins and they get caught in nets and eaten by sharks. Stop it. Stop it. Don't let it happen right now. You are confusing me.
Garg was the subject of a number of lawsuits from the likes of PIMCO and Goldman Sachs for things like "improper and even fraudulent activity at two prior business ventures, and of misappropriating "tens of millions of dollars."
Better.com is laying off some of its employees because of the recent dip in refinancings.
Better.com said in April 2020 that it was hiring aggressively as more people were looking to refinance their homes in the face of historically low mortgage rates. I had reported that Garg was looking to hire about 1,000 people in 2020 as more and more homeowners come online for their needs.
Better.com's PR, comms, marketing heads resigned in the wake of layoffs.
