This told essay is based on conversations with Ivan Ureña-Valdes, who has worked as a data analyst at Block for nearly four years. Edited for length and clarity.
I was in the middle of interviewing someone for a role on The Block when I received an email from Jack Dorsey.
This was very strange. Because I knew that when layoffs happened in the past, people had their access reduced almost immediately.
I received a message from a colleague saying, “Hey, are you okay?” My heart started racing. I knew from that message that it probably meant I was going to be fired.
I was in the middle of interviewing someone and I felt really bad. I had to tell them, “Actually, I just left the company. You probably won’t be able to submit your feedback in time. Please contact your recruiter.”
I am the only one supporting my family. It was difficult.
I had a hunch that AI would someday lead to reductions.
We knew there were a lot of performance cuts happening now, but they’re almost done. I didn’t see this cut coming.
The fact that more than 4,000 jobs were cut without anyone knowing about it shows that the decision was made very high up.
I’ve survived three layoffs across the company, across the engineering organization. I knew I wasn’t being fired for performance-related reasons. I was in the middle of working on two big projects. This is probably the biggest project I’ve worked on since joining the company.
I had a hunch that someday companies would cut staff due to AI. But I didn’t think it was now.
Working at Block, I’ve seen how AI automates tasks.
I appreciate Jack’s honesty. It’s much fairer for him to be honest and say why it happened, it’s because of the AI and the vision he’s seeing.
To be honest, I am grateful for the generous retirement allowance and welfare benefits. It definitely helps make a difficult situation a little easier.
I’ve been feeling the buzz of AI disruption for a while now, especially since Anthropic released Opus 4.5 late last year.
Jack loved AI and was always encouraging us to use it. I needed to use these tools as much as possible every day.
I quickly realized how much of my job was already automated. Much of the data analyst world is about finding the right dataset, writing something to get the data set you want, and generating output. Thanks to AI, each of these steps is significantly faster and easier.
It was definitely an “aha” moment when I realized how powerful things had become.
AI will continue to replace jobs
I 100% think we’ll probably see more disruption and these types of layoffs at other companies, and that would be a shame.
I’m probably a lot more pessimistic about all of that than a lot of other people.
Given that we live in the United States, where growth is everything, it is inevitable that AI will replace humans wherever it is economically advantageous.
I’m optimistic that I can find a job in the general data field that I’m very passionate about and that pays as much as it did before. I had developed very strong bonds with my co-workers, so it would be difficult to find something that suited the environment I was working in. In the world of data analytics and business intelligence, pay was fair and roles were remote.
There are great companies out there doing great work, but I’m nervous about the industry as a whole and how competitive it is as I search for the perfect next role. While some people at AI companies are getting really high salaries, a lot of people at Block are being laid off.
Do you have a story to share about tech layoffs? Contact this reporter at: cmlee@businessinsider.com or Signal at cmlee.81.
