- An Xbox executive suggested that laid-off employees use AI for emotional support and career guidance
- The suggestion sparked backlash and led the executive to delete their LinkedIn post
- Microsoft has laid off 9,000 employees in recent months while investing heavily in AI.
Microsoft has been hyping up its AI ambitions for the last several years, but one executive’s pitch about the power of AI to former employees who were recently let go has landed with an awkward thud.
Amid the largest round of layoffs in over two years, about 9,000 people, Matt Turnbull, Executive Producer at Xbox Game Studios Publishing, suggested that AI chatbots could help those affected process their grief, craft resumes, and rebuild their confidence.
The gesture was meant for support, but it left many game developers feeling outraged.
Turnbull took his possibly well-meaning but definitely poorly phrased and timed message to LinkedIn. He shared ideas for prompts to give an AI chatbot that he claimed might help laid-off colleagues navigate career uncertainty and emotional turbulence.
The backlash was swift and angry, leading him to delete the post, but you can still read it thanks to Brandon Sheffield’s Bluesky post below.
Matt Turnbull, Executive Producer at Xbox Game Studios Publishing – after the Microsoft layoffs – suggesting on Linkedin that may maybe people who have been let go should turn to AI for help. He seriously thought posting this would be a good idea.
— @brandon.insertcredit.com (@brandon.insertcredit.com.bsky.social) 2025-07-07T07:54:06.534Z
Turnbull urged colleagues to lean on AI to reduce the “emotional and cognitive load” of job loss in his post, along with the prompt ideas for 30-day recovery plans and LinkedIn messages. Probably the most eyebrow-raising suggestion was suggesting a prompt to help reframe impostor syndrome after being laid off.
“No AI tool is a replacement for your voice or lived experience,” Turnbull wrote. “But in times when mental energy is scarce, these tools can help you get unstuck faster, calmer, and with more clarity.”
Even the most charitable interpretation of his post can’t overlook just how condescending and poorly timed the advice is. And angry game developers flooded the comments, likely leading to the deletion of the post.
To put it mildly, they don’t agree that being laid off is an emotional puzzle best solved with an algorithm. Instead, perhaps a human might understand the career and life upheaval it represents, and how that requires human compassion, support networks, and tangible help, like, say, an introduction to someone who can help you get a new job.
AI therapy
This incident is even worse in the context of Microsoft spending billions building AI infrastructure while dramatically shrinking its gaming teams. Urging laid-off developers to lean on AI right after losing their jobs is more than hypocritical; it’s telling people to use the very technology that may have caused their job loss.
To be scrupulously and overly fair to Turnbull, using AI could help with some mental health concerns and might be useful in improving a resume or preparing for a job interview. Making AI part of outplacement services isn’t a horrible idea. It could boost the internal coaching and career-transition arm Microsoft offers already, adding to the recruiters, résumé workshops, and counselling it offers. But it can’t and shouldn’t replace those human services. And having one of the people who let you go tell you to use AI to find a new job is the opposite of supportive. It’s just an insult on top of injury.
Microsoft’s dual approach of laying people off and doubling down on AI infrastructure is a test of its company culture as much as its technical ability. Will we see a new standard where layoffs come with AI prompt packages instead of counseling and severance? If the message is, “Feel free to use chatbots to help you after we fire you,” expect plenty more outrageous, tone-deaf nonsense from executives.
Perhaps they should ask those chatbots how to interact with human beings without angering them, since it’s a lesson they haven’t learned well.
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