monday.com filed "AI growth" with the SEC, told staff it wasn't about AI
600 jobs, 20% of the company, and two stories that can't both be true.
Morning everyone!
Two sentences left monday.com this week. One went to the SEC. One went to the staff. They do not describe the same event.
On July 22, the company filed a restructuring plan cutting about 600 roles, 20% of its people, and told regulators it supports a leaner operating model as it “continues to invest in its AI-driven growth strategy.” That’s the version for the market. AI as the engine, cuts as the fuel.
Then co-founder Eran Zinman wrote to the people losing their jobs and told them the opposite:
“While we are seeing significant value from AI internally, this decision was not made to reduce costs or replace people with AI. This change was made to adapt the company to our new vision.”
The stock is down roughly 74% year over year, which is the context nobody put in a memo. When a number like that is on your desk, “restructuring for the AI era” is a much better press release than “the multiple compressed and we over-hired.” Both can be true. Only one gets said out loud.
You will see this framing again. Probably from a company you respect. The tell isn’t whether AI is mentioned. It’s whether the timeline of the stock chart lines up better than the timeline of the technology.
— Peter & Torsten
Numbers matter
90% vs 18% — Share of organizations that say AI is transforming their workflows, against the share seeing significant revenue impact from it, per HCLTech.
A 72-point gap between “everything changed” and “it showed up in the P&L,” which is the gap every AI reorg is quietly betting it can close.
Daily prompt
I’m considering restructuring my marketing team around AI. Play three skeptical readers: a board member, a top performer who’d stay, and a reporter. For each, write the two hardest questions they’d ask, and mark any place my rationale sounds like cost-cutting wearing an AI costume. Then tell me what would need to be true for the “growth, not cuts” framing to actually hold.
Use this the week before you announce anything, not after. The gap between monday.com’s SEC filing and its staff memo is what happens when nobody pressure-tests the story first. Run this, and you’ll either fix the framing or discover you don’t believe it, both of which are better found in private.
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CMO corner
Leadership is designing value flows, not proving your value.
The reorg question underneath the reorg: what is a leader actually for once the doing is automated? If your answer is “oversight,” you’re describing friction. Design the flow, set the standard, then get out of its way.
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Tool upgrade
If your team really is going leaner, protect the hours you free up instead of letting meetings eat them. Three tools for doing more with fewer people:
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Learn this
The part every reorg skips is the people who stay:
It’s for the leader who has to rebuild trust and momentum after a hard change, when half the room is updating their LinkedIn. Practical moves for keeping your best people bought in, not just retained.
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That’s it for today!
See you next time,
— Peter & Torsten
