Dear Employees of Microsoft and LinkedIn

Meet your new coworkers.

Big mergers and acquisitions for employees is like learning square-dancing in a gymnasium but with 50,000 people. For mid-level managers? It’s like engaging in an epic game of twister with other managers while watching your boss play musical chairs.

Yesterday, we at Blind made the decision to open a private channel on our anonymous community app, exclusive to Microsoft and LinkedIn employees. Think a digital-masquerade-happy-hour if you will.

There really is no easy way for employees to meet their new coworkers and partners before, during or after a large M&A.

With over 1 in 6 Microsoft employees and 1 in 5 LinkedIn employees verified on Blind, our team really thought we could add value here. To our knowledge, there has never been an anonymous, exclusive space for employees from two different companies to come mingle, share knowledge, and create opportunities for each other.

Just imagine the kind of questions you could ask.

Am I safe? Does my role overlap with someone else? What is the severance package like?

Do our benefits change? When? How? What if I’m thinking of starting a family?

What kind of perks are we getting/losing? When?

Is my team going to grow? Are we getting absorbed into a larger org? What is the management there like?

Are there transfer opportunities? If so, what is living in Redmond, WA like? How much are single family homes in Sunnyvale, CA? Schools in the area?

etc.

Microsoft acquisitions of the past

Over the years some of our favorite tech companies married into the Microsoft family and well… Skype lost quite a bit of weight (400 employees), Yammer moved out, and the Nokia divorce cost $7.6 billion dollars.

LinkedIn is different though. Of the two hundred acquisitions by MSFT, LI is by far the most prominent at $26.3 billion, the biggest bet MS has ever made. It is also the first major acquisition under Satya’s reign and it’s worth mentioning that LinkedIn comes with seasoned leadership. Jeff Weiner constantly ranks as one of the most respected CEO’s in tech today and recently, Kevin Scott, who led engineering at LinkedIn, was announced as Microsoft’s new CTO; emphasizing the importance of bringing engineering together for the two tech goliaths.

The need for more hierarchy free conversations

Whether or not Microsoft and LinkedIn will create synergy still remains to be seen, but we at Blind believe the need for transparency and conversation between employees is at an all-time high.

You could be a manager, a new hire, an executive, or an HR professional. This acquisition affects everyone and a safe, open, community-regulated hierarchy-free space that is neutral from company interest is now available on Blind.

There‘s visibility into employee sentiment for HR and leadership, equal voice for everyone and no professional barriers so you can finally ask sensitive and personal questions that can help you navigate your career.

Thank you for your continued support. We would have never gotten this far as a company without our users from Microsoft and LinkedIn.

Written by: Alex Shin, Head of Operations at TeamBlind

TeamBlind is VC-backed and based in San Francisco, CA. We create and distribute Blind, a truly anonymous community app for the workplace. Users are verified and grouped by company/industry.

Blind is available on the App Store and Google Play and is currently exclusive to employees at top 100 tech companies.

With any questions or feedback, please reach out to: blindapp@teamblind.com