Xbox has just dismissed 9,000 employees and one executive producer had the guts to tell the cutting staff to use AI for ’emotional clarity and trust’
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- An Xbox director suggested that dismissed employees use AI for emotional support and career guidance
- The suggestion led to a recoil and led the manager to remove their LinkedIn -post
- Microsoft has fired 9,000 employees in recent months while he invests heavily in AI.
Microsoft Has hyped its AI ambitions in recent years, but the pitch of one director about the power of AI to former employees who were recently released landed with an awkward thud.
In the midst of the largest round of dismissals in more than two years, about 9,000 people, Matt Turnbull, executive producer at Xbox Game Studios Publishing, suggested that AI -Chatbots can help to process their grief, craft CVs and rebuild their self -confidence.
The gesture was intended for support, but it let many game developers feel furious.
Turnbull took his possibly well -meaning but certainly poorly formulated and timed message to LinkedIn. He shared ideas for instructions to give an AI chatbot That he claimed could help to help colleagues navigate through career uncertainty and emotional turbulence.
The return was quick and angry and led him to remove the message, but you can still read it thanks to the Bluesky post of Brandon Sheffield below.
Matt Turnbull, executive producer at Xbox Game Studios Publishing – after the fired Microsoft – suggests on LinkedIn that people who have been released can turn to AI for help. He seriously thought that posting this would be a good idea.
– @brandon.insertcredit.com (@brandon.insertencredit.com.bsky.social)) 2025-07-07T07: 54: 06.534Z
Turnbull urged colleagues to rely on AI to reduce the “emotional and cognitive charge” of job losses in his post, along with the rapid ideas for 30-day recovery plans and LinkedIn messages. Probably the most eyebrow-increasing suggestion was a prompt suggestion to help reformulate the impostor syndrome after he was fired.
“No AI tool is a replacement for your voice or lived experience,” wrote Turnbull. “But in times when mental energy is scarce, these tools can help you get stuck faster, calmer and with more clarity.”
Even the most charitable interpretation of his function cannot overlook how condescending and poorly timed the advice is. And angry game developers have flooded the comments, probably which led to the removal of the post.
To say the least, they do not agree that being fired is an emotional puzzle that is best solved with an algorithm. Instead, a person may understand the career and life of life that it represents, and how that requires human compassion, requires networking and tangible help, such as an introduction to someone who can help you get a new job.
AI therapy
This incident is even worse in the context of Microsoft that spends billions on building AI infrastructure, while it reduces its gaming teams dramatically. Encouraging dismissed developers to lean on AI Immediately after losing their job is more than hypocritical; It tells people to use the technology that may have caused their job losses.
To be meticulous and overly honest for Turnbull, the use of AI can help with some psychological problems and it can be useful to improve a CV or Preparation for a job interview. AI part of making outplacement services is not a terrible idea. It can stimulate internal coaching and career transition arm Microsoft already offers, which adds to the recruiters, central heating workshops and counseling it offers. But it cannot and must not replace those human services. And one of the people who let you tell you to use AI to find a new job is the opposite of supportive. It is just an insult on top of injury.
The double approach of Microsoft to make people and to double on AI infrastructure is a test of its corporate culture as much as the technical capacity. Shall we see a new standard where dismissals are supplied with AI prompt packages instead of counseling and severance payment? When the message is: “Feel free to use chatbots to help you after we fire you”, expect many more outrageous, tone deaf nonsense from managers.
Maybe they should ask those chatbots how they can deal with people without making them angry, because it is a lesson that they did not learn well.
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