After breakout year, Pocket FM contends with growth woes

“It almost felt like I was in an episode of Squid Game,” says a former employee of audio series platform Pocket FM, recalling her stint there. Drawing parallels with the popular Korean show about a bunch of people who play a set of games, putting their lives at stake, would seem exaggerated. She doesn’t regret the comparison, though. At Pocket FM, she says their jobs were on the line.  

She held a mid-senior role at Pocket FM, managing a team of people that converted audio episodes into visuals using artificial intelligence. One day, she was suddenly called for a meeting with HR. “I walked in not knowing what to expect. There, I was told that I was fired. In a few minutes, my access to my work email and Slack was revoked,” she recalls. “Later, I found out that this was because the creative property I was working on at that time didn’t perform well on Meta.” 

This 30-year-old wasn’t the only one to exit the audio platform this way. The CapTable spoke to at least seven former Pocket FM employees, both full-time and contract employees, who were fired over what they describe as “five-minute” calls. One former employee claims he was fired the day he applied for paternity leave, while another, a manager, recalls being terminated over a phone call, allegedly after he raised concerns about the work culture. The company, however, says it honoured all contractual commitments and followed due process. “Claims to the contrary are false,” says the official spokesperson.