Memorandum
- From
- Delaney Sawyer via Fast Company
- Date
- Filed
- Business·5 min to read
- Re
Bending Spoons Product Lead Draws Backlash for Announcing Airtable Layoffs in Product Launch Post
ReBending Spoons Product Lead Draws Backlash for Announcing Airtable Layoffs in Product Launch Post
Federico Simionato, a product leader at Milan-based Bending Spoons, announced major layoffs at Airtable in a brief post on X that mixed the job cuts with news of upcoming product features, drawing widespread criticism for its tone. Airtable's new product lead later said departing staff would receive substantial separation packages.
A product leader at Bending Spoons, the Milan-based software company that acquired Airtable last month, has drawn widespread criticism after announcing a major round of layoffs at the San Francisco company in a social media post that paired the job cuts with promotional details about upcoming Airtable features.
Federico Simionato wrote on X that the company was «laying off a large part of the Airtable team,» adding that the decision was «not a reflection of their work but a reflection of our deep belief that small teams ship more and better.» In the same post, he highlighted what he described as coming improvements at Airtable, including a «new Core team shipping your top requests monthly,» upgrades to Omni, Airtable Canvas, a stronger MCP, and new Performance and Infra teams focused on speeding up bases and increasing limits on records, fields, and syncs. He closed by thanking departing employees and urging hiring managers to consider them.
The reaction was swift and sharply negative. Commenters described the tone as insensitive and self-promotional, with one user writing that turning a layoff announcement into a product launch was «genuinely pioneering work in the field of corporate sociopathy.» Another said that «celebrating layoffs is not a flex, no matter how you try to dress it up,» while a third called it «the most unempathetic thing I’ve read in my life.» In a reply to one critic, Simionato insisted he was «not celebrating at all,» describing it as «a hard day for good people» and saying he preferred to be «upfront about why than vague about it.»
Bending Spoons, which completed its initial public offering in July, has built a reputation for acquiring established software companies such as Vimeo, AOL, and Evernote and overhauling their operations to improve performance. It purchased Airtable in a $1.28 billion all-cash deal last month. The layoffs are part of that pattern of major organizational change following an acquisition.
In a longer statement released shortly after Simionato's post, new Airtable product lead Alessandro Savarese said departing staff «will be leaving by the end of the week with substantial separation packages.» He added that the decision «wasn’t taken lightly, and it doesn’t reflect on the team’s excellent work,» crediting their «passion and dedication» with making Airtable «the product and business it is today.»
Communications professionals said the episode illustrates a broader risk for executives navigating public announcements about job cuts. Oliver Ellerton, managing partner at Ellerton & Co. Public Relations, told Fast Company that Simionato's post was an example of «confusing corporate conviction with public empathy.» He said that while it is fair to believe smaller teams build better businesses, «announcing significant layoffs is not the best time to make the case for how clever that strategy is.» He described it as «another example of something that probably sounds perfectly reasonable in a boardroom but belongs nowhere near a public statement or social media post.»
Ellerton added that the post risks being read by affected employees as management «congratulating itself on becoming more efficient at your expense,» even if the intent was to project confidence and decisiveness. He warned that such missteps can carry «reputational consequences that outlast the initial controversy,» noting that a badly judged post can become the first thing a prospective employee finds when researching a company. «The employees who remain are watching this too,» he said. «You can be confident in your strategy without sounding pleased about the human cost.»
The episode follows a similar controversy just days earlier, when HubSpot founder Dharmesh Shah faced criticism for a 28-word LinkedIn post thanking hundreds of laid-off employees. One user called that message «cold and impersonal,» and another described it as an «insincere gesture of good fellowship.» Shah later apologized for the «curt and insensitive» tone, saying he should have shown more «care and empathy.»
3
