Unlock Editor’s Digest for free
FT editor Roula Khalaf selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
Linda Yaccarino has shaken up her inner circle at X as she faces pressure to increase revenue and cut costs a year after taking over as CEO from Elon Musk.
Yaccarino fired her right-hand man and head of business operations and communications, Joe Benarroch, this month, three people familiar with the matter said.
Yaccarino blamed Benarroch, among other things, for botching the rollout of the platform’s new adult content policies by failing to inform customers about the changes before they became public, two X employees said.
Benarroch’s duties will be taken over by Nick Pickles, head of global government affairs, whose role has been temporarily expanded to include leading all global communications, the people said.
This week, Pickles, one of the few top Twitter employees to survive the billionaire’s takeover, attended the Cannes advertising festival for the first time alongside Yaccarino and Musk, several people said.
The shake-up is seen as a blessing for British-born Pickles, who once stood for office in the UK as a Conservative MP before rising quickly within the party to become responsible for public policy and government relations.
The reshuffle comes amid growing tensions between Musk and Yaccarino over their efforts to stabilize X’s financial health, a year after Musk poached her from NBCUniversal.
One senior X employee said she became increasingly nervous as Musk pushed her to increase sales and cut expenses, including laying off employees in the U.S. and U.K. sales teams and cutting spending on things like travel.
Another said some of the recent departures were due to regular performance reviews. At a meeting this month, Yaccarino said the focus would be on “performance reviews,” company insiders said.
Coinciding with Yaccarino’s changes, Steve Davis, a longtime Musk ally and chairman of his Boring Company, was hired by the billionaire in April to review X’s finances and performance management, two people familiar with the matter say.
Davis is considering firing poorly performing employees, one person said, and has dozens of positions in his sights, another added. Some saw the move as a sign of ongoing concerns about the platform’s finances.
Davis, an aerospace expert, helped lead cost-cutting efforts during X’s acquisition in late 2022 and early 2023, including making job cuts, reducing ongoing expenses, and renegotiating the company’s data licensing agreements and policies.
These efforts sparked speculation that he might be in the running for the CEO position after Musk bought X (then known as Twitter) and fired the then-CEO.
Two people familiar with Yaccarino’s thinking said she was aware he posed a threat to her authority. Davis’ wife also works at X and is responsible for the platform’s real estate strategy, another person said.
Davis’ new duties were first reported by The Verge.
This week in Cannes, Musk and Yaccarino tried to personally win back the heads of advertising agencies and brands after companies such as Disney, IBM and Apple pulled their spending on the platform over concerns about content moderation and Musk’s provocative leadership style and posts.
Executives at X said more than 60 percent of brands that had paused advertising have resumed advertising in recent months, albeit at a reduced rate.
A person familiar with the talks between Musk and advertisers said X’s management had stressed that the platform was safe for brands and highlighted new features such as videos and targeted marketing. But some advertising chiefs at Cannes told the Financial Times that the site was not on their “preferred” list of channels they use with their brand clients.
X and Musk did not respond to requests for comment. Benarroch, whose departure was first reported by the Wall Street Journal, did not respond to requests for comment.