An Open Letter to Twilio’s Leadership

Twilio has, beyond a shadow of a doubt, been engaging in discriminatory practices against LGBTQ+ and disabled employees. In this letter, I will prove it.

I urge Twilio to engage an external investigator to fully examine the longstanding marginalization of their employees, and to act in good faith to rectify these issues. Twilio should make the employees that they wronged whole financially, and release them from restrictive severance agreements so they do not need to choose between feeding their families and justice. Finally, I ask that Christy Lake step down, as much of this failure has occurred under her watch as Chief People Officer, demonstrating a deep misalignment with Twilio’s stated values of inclusion and empathy.

Twilio’s legal, press, and HR teams were provided with an advanced draft of this letter on November 9th, along with updated drafts in the days leading up to publication, to allow them an opportunity to correct any inaccuracies. No direct response was received. However, during this period, Twilio laid off a lead of their LGBTQ+ ERG in what appeared to be a small, targeted layoff. While I lack concrete data to conclusively determine a pattern, this marks the third lead of this ERG to be laid off under similar circumstances within three years.

Later in this letter, I will also address Twilio’s restrictive severance agreements. For transparency, I declined their severance offer in order to speak about these issues openly.

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