After being fired from his “dream job” at software giant Atlassian, Rubio* wants one thing: to get out of business.
“We probably exceeded expectations, but there’s no explanation from the company as a whole as to why this happened,” he says.
“The only thing I want other than receiving my severance package is to find out why I was chosen.”
Last Thursday morning, Atlassian laid off 1,600 employees, about 10% of its workforce. This included nearly 500 Australian staff.
Some have been at the forefront of incorporating AI into the company’s products. Some of them had been working there for more than 10 years. Some people took vacations after finding out there were no jobs available.
Guardian Australia spoke to four former Australian employees. Three of them were laid off last week, and one resigned due to fears of layoffs.
They say the layoffs came without warning.
It felt like a “lack of humanity,” Rubio said. He woke up at 8 a.m. that Thursday morning and saw an email warning him of his fate.
He says he was blocked from logging into his work laptop after just 30 minutes.
“It was just hard to stop…I had no idea what to do with myself during the day,” he says.
“I had no idea when I was actually going to receive my severance package because it wasn’t communicated very well. I literally had to start the process of finding a new role as soon as I got the email.”
In a memo to employees the same morning, Atlassian co-founder Mike Cannon-Brooks said the company needs to become more nimble, invest more in AI and eventually break even.
“We thought we were safe.”
In 2021, Atlassian was valued at USD 77 billion. The company adopted a “teams everywhere” policy of remote work, began hiring rapidly during the pandemic, maintained a relaxed work culture, and attracted top software talent before sending staff to team retreats.
But investors started selling software companies. The company’s value fell to US$53 billion by early 2025, halved the following year, and halved again in just two months.
Its value is currently estimated at approximately US$13 billion (A$18 billion).
Despite generating billions of dollars in revenue from business subscriptions to workflow tools like Trello, it hasn’t turned a profit in nearly a decade, and investors are worried that the company will use AI to create its tools.
Designer Rebecca* says falling stock prices fueled rumors of layoffs, which were further exacerbated by Amazon, Block, Salesforce, and Pinterest pledging to cut jobs and expand adoption of AI.
Atlassian has also started hiring AI “teammates” to help staff do more, she says.
Then, in February, it suspended recruitment. The company closed many offices soon afterward, citing low occupancy.
The team’s training camp, where staff from all over the country gather to enjoy “unity,” has been postponed.
Rebecca thought her team would be left alone. They were at the forefront of adding AI to Atlassian products, using the technology itself to speed up work.
“We thought we were safe,” she says.
“These AI agents have been and will continue to be really, really helpful to people, but you can’t use something like that to replace an actual human worker.”
However, layoffs were made. Most were in key software areas of research and development, such as engineering, product, design, and all areas that employ AI tools.
Rebecca says she thinks little consideration was given to success, personal ability, or life circumstances.
“I’m really stuck. Given a lot of our circumstances, I don’t think I could have handled this very well,” she says.
“They obviously made a mistake and fired so many people. [are] I am passionate about focusing on improving and building new features and capabilities within AI. ”
Staff have heard stories of people who were laid off while on parental leave and were just weeks away from returning to work. Some had to spend the morning cradling crying children, worried about having to move.
Cannon-Brookes told staff the roles affected had been carefully considered.
“We took a thoughtful and thorough approach to determining the roles affected…and focused on retaining Atlassians with the skills to help us grow as an AI-first company,” Cannon-Brookes wrote in the memo.
“Our approach is not that AI will replace humans.”
Those affected found out through an out-of-the-blue email and video from Cannon-Brooks, after which they were given some time. You can say goodbye to colleagues through your company’s Slack messaging channel.
Rebecca couldn’t even watch the video. She said she was locked out of her staff account just an hour after being notified of her termination.
“I couldn’t use it for long, I just looked at it for about five minutes,” Rebecca says.
“I can’t access Slack, I can’t access anything from Atlassian… and I can’t talk to anyone about my situation.”
Is there “no choice” but to make a major shift toward AI?
Atlassian was once known for its generous policies towards its staff.
But Shaji*, the laid-off engineer, says the environment has deteriorated since the company started focusing on efficiency in 2024.
Around that time, Atlassian updated its performance appraisal system, which led to increased stress for employees everywhere, Shaji said.
The new system “Apex” aims to recognize and reward outstanding performers. Internal research shows that employee satisfaction has increased and developers can complete some tasks in half the time since implementation.
“They were very open about the fact that they wanted to increase the number of ‘unfortunate leavers’ – basically people who were not performing well.” [managed] Outside… [and] I have recovered quite a bit,” says Shaji.
The company also began encouraging and training its staff to use AI tools. Shaji said it was understood that the company views its approach to AI as a “thoughtful experiment”, but some companies will be required to use AI by mid-2025.
“For simple bugs and vulnerabilities, I was faster than the AI,” Shaji says.
“But as my workload started to increase, I started using AI more, and I started or needed to start working 12-hour days to complete this backload and tasks I received. [automating] my job. ”
Cannon-Brooks told staff in the letter that the company has no choice but to make a major shift toward AI.
“The bar for what is ‘great’ for software companies is rising, including growth, profitability, speed, and value creation,” he wrote.
“It would be disingenuous to pretend that AI won’t change the mix of skills we need or the number of roles we need in a given field, which it does.”
“AI cleaning”
Mr. Rubio has accused the company of “AI washing.”
“No amount of AI can replace good engineers,” he says.
“You’ll probably end up shooting yourself in the foot at a later date when something happens and you don’t know how to resolve it.”
Atlassian is understood to require employees to be accountable for decisions, regardless of whether AI is used to inform them.
Shaji also said improved AI tools could help replace the expertise and hours lost by former colleagues.
“They’re making a big bet saying…they can fire people who have all the organizational knowledge because it’s supposed to be in their product,” he says.
Dave* left the company in mid-2025 due to fear of layoffs. He was right.
But with AI threatening to disrupt the software industry, he believes Atlassian had few other options.
“Part of this is just business,” he says. “The reality is that a lot of things that people want to do can be automated.”
*Names have been changed to protect privacy.
