Timing and place certainly matter. A cartoon duck can lift the spirits and be a funny gesture, but you probably shouldn't send one to someone you just laid off.
However, a major financial company ended up doing just that. The move can be described as tactless at best, and that's being pretty generous. As a result, the company is getting some major flack. Stripes laid off around 300 people on Monday. This accounted for around 3.5% of its current employees. It's laying off engineering, product, and also operating roles.
Stripe is a major financial company that works with Amazon, Blockchain, Slack, and also Alaska Airlines. Ideally, the best way to lay someone off is in person or even via phone call. You should treat it similarly to a breakup, and no one likes to get ghosted or made to feel worthless. But Stripe decided to send emails letting those affected know they were out of a job.
Unfortunately, they also attached a cartoon duck labeled "US-Non-California Duck" in the email as well. As you can imagine, workers were quite angry at the cartoon duck. They took to Blind, which is a site where anonymous workers can vent, to voice their frustrations.
The Cartoon Duck Of It All
"Never liked it when someone put a duck on my Jeep...this would have sent me over the edge," one Blind user registered as a Stripe employee wrote.
However, it seems to be a bit of an accident rather than a misguided attempt at levity. A spokesperson said that the cartoon duck was accidentally added to the emails. Additionally, they messed up the termination dates on the emails as well. Apparently, all of these employees then got corrected emails without the cartoon duck.
"I apologize for the error and any confusion it caused," Rob McIntosh, Stripe's chief people officer, said in an email. "Corrected and full notifications have since been sent to all impacted Stripes."
However, despite the layoffs, the company is actually hoping to grow its workforce by 10,000 employees before the end of the year. That's probably worse to laidoff employees than the cartoon duck, honestly. Stripe is one of the largest startups in California and is worth $70 billion. That being said, it's not the first time the company has had layoffs. However, they typically don't include a cartoon duck.
