Shopify has declared war on meetings. Last week, the Canadian ecommerce giant enforced its “chaos monkey 2023” initiative, under which all meetings scheduled to involve more than two people vanished from the calendars of its 9,000 employees without warning. Following a two-week moratorium, staff are under instruction to “be really critical” about which meetings they reintroduce.
But Shopify didn’t stop there. It also shut down public channels on its messaging platform, Slack. These included forums where people could hold virtual watercooler conversations. The company has stipulated that Slack should be used only for direct messages.
“These changes will help focus our time… and improve our operational excellence,” the company explained in an internal memo seen by businessinsider.com.