BOSTON, MA — An unnamed Boston tech company announced this week that it will eliminate 666 positions of its workforce, as part of a sweeping organizational restructuring conducted in partnership with Lucfr, a boutique Las Vegas management consultancy specializing in transformation, operational efficiency and the eternal damnation of the human soul.
The company declined to identify itself for this story, citing competitive concerns, employee privacy and a clause in its consulting agreement written entirely in blood. (A representative confirmed the blood was not taken without the consent of employees who were dedicated enough to actually keep their jobs.)
In a message to employees, leadership explained that the company is reorganizing around customer outcomes, reducing management layers, and giving smaller AI teams greater ownership over decisions.
Lucfr Partner Malphas A. Morningstar told The Deliverable that these are all encouraging signs.
“Whenever we hear phrases like ‘flatter organization,’ ‘clear ownership’ and ‘operating with greater speed,’ our ears perk right up,” Morningstar said. “Historically, those words indicate a company is ready to begin separating its workforce into employees who create shareholder value and employees who have families.”
The restructuring comes despite continued revenue growth and improving profitability, developments Morningstar said made this an especially attractive time to fire hundreds of people.
“A common misconception is that layoffs happen because a company is failing,” he said. “That’s an antiquated way of thinking. Modern layoffs can occur because the company is failing, succeeding, succeeding insufficiently fast, succeeding very fast but perhaps not forever, or simply because someone made a PowerPoint slide showing what the margin could look like with 666 fewer salaries.”
Company leadership emphasized that the restructuring should not be viewed simply as a cost-cutting exercise.
Lucfr agreed.
“Cost cutting sounds negative,” Morningstar said. “We prefer human capital reallocation into the external labor market.”
According to the company, roles were evaluated using several criteria, including strategic necessity, organizational layers, capacity, capabilities, leadership needs and whether positions helped drive revenue.
Lucfr added a seventh criterion:
“Does keeping this person employed increase or decrease the probability of moving the needle?”
Morningstar declined to specify which needle.
“The needle,” he repeated.
The company has also been reorganizing itself around AI-enabled customer outcomes, although leadership stressed that the layoffs were not the result of productivity gains from artificial intelligence.
Morningstar said that distinction is extremely important.
“AI did not replace these people,” he explained, “people did. The company simply changed its entire operating model because of AI, reorganized its workforce around AI, redirected investment toward AI and then discovered that 666 existing employees no longer fit inside the organization.”
He paused.
“Completely different.”
Employees affected by the restructuring will receive a cookie with the company logo and a farewell greeting card signed by all their former teammates.
Morningstar praised the package.
“We strongly support giving terminated employees cookies,” he said.
At press time, the company’s stock had reacted favorably to something, which executives interpreted as confirmation that everything they had ever done was correct.
Shortly before The Deliverable legal department was laid off suddenly as part of our commitment to increasing shareholder value, they had advised we disclose that Lucfr, Malphas A. Morningstar, and the infernal consulting relationship described in this article are entirely fictional. This is satire. Boston and Las Vegas are not fictional cities, but we do not intend to imply there is any sort of infernal occurrences happening in, to, around, or because of those cities in any way whatsoever. Except maybe when it comes to their sports franchises. Maybe. How do you like dem apples huh, Bahstan? BAHSTAHN PAHK YA CAH.
We apologize. The Deliverable comedy writing department was also laid off suddenly.