A laid-off Twitter exec who went viral for sleeping on the office floor says people who are afraid of being 'dunked on' should stay 'small and invisible'

• A laid-off Twitter exec said people who are afraid of criticism should stay "small and invisible."
• Esther Crawford had become known for her commitment to Elon Musk's "Twitter 2.0."
• Critics have questioned her loyalty to Musk. One tech exec suggested she may have "enabled his worst behaviors."

A Twitter executive who went viral for sleeping on the office floor and became known for her commitment to Elon Musk's "Twitter 2.0" said that people who are afraid of being "publicly dunked on" should stay "small and invisible."

Esther Crawford had worked as a director of product management at the social-media giant until she was reportedly laid off over the weekend. Crawford and Twitter did not respond to Insider's request for comment on whether she had left the company and the circumstances surrounding this.

During her time at Twitter, Crawford was seen as an embodiment of Musk's "hardcore" work culture. A profile by the Financial Times suggested that she was a divisive figure at the company, with some current and former workers describing her as empathetic and diplomatic, while others said she was an opportunist.

In early November, just days after Musk took control of the site, she was photographed seemingly asleep on the floor of the company's San Francisco headquarters. Crawford also defended Musk's initial mass layoffs, in which thousands of jobs were cut, in an internal Slack channel, The Verge reported.

"The worst take you could have from watching me go all-in on Twitter 2.0 is that my optimism or hard work was a mistake," Crawford tweeted Sunday, shortly after reports of her alleged termination emerged. "Those who jeer & mock are necessarily on the sidelines and not in the arena."

While many people expressed their support for Crawford and congratulated her on her achievements at Twitter, some took the opportunity to mock her.

"Girl you're not supposed to swallow the boot," one said. "All your hard work is reflected in the quality of the current Twitter user experience," another said, apparently referencing recent issues with the site.

Crawford seemingly addressed the publicity in a further tweet on Monday.

"If you can't take being publicly dunked on then be sure to avoid taking any risks and stay away from all leadership roles," Crawford tweeted. "Don't build or disrupt anything. Stay small and invisible and most of all, be silent and afraid of what others think."

Her post attracted further criticism from Twitter users who questioned why she chose to support Musk after he took over the company. Musk's leadership has been characterized by mass layoffs and strings of resignations, botched feature rollouts, and the decision to allow several controversial figures back onto the platform, including former President Donald Trump.

"Leadership is doing the right thing at a personal cost when no one else can," a Github engineer said in response to Crawford's tweet on Monday. "Obsessively pushing for a series of risky initiatives (and apparently they were bad) while being publicly excessively obedient don't necessarily count as leadership."

"It's also possible you've sided with someone who has been at best a bad manager and at worst an abusive manager; and not only that you've enabled his worst behaviors and now you are thrown under the bus and people you've indirectly hurt are wondering if you'll reflect," a tech-industry exec tweeted.