While several people in the gaming industry have been offering words of support and encouragement to their peers that have been affected by various project cancellations and lay-offs at Microsoft, an executive producer for Xbox Game Studios Publishing, Matt Turnbull, has caught some flak. In a since-deleted post on LinkedIn, Turnbull suggested that those who lost their jobs should use LLMs (large language models) like ChatGPT or Copilot to help them with “career planning and emotional clarity”.
In his post, which you can see archived below thanks to Necrosoft Games director Brandon Sheffield, Turnbull offered some advice on the kinds of prompts that those affected by lay-offs can use on LLMs to get career advice, help with networking and outreach, and even help with formatting their resumes.
“These are really challenging times, and if you’re navigating a layoff or even quietly preparing for one, you’re not a lone and you don’t have to go it alone,” wrote Turnbull. “I know these types of tools engender strong feelings in people, but I’d be remiss in not trying to offer the best advice I can under the circumstances. I’ve been experimenting with ways to use LLM AI tools (like ChatGPT or Copilot) to help reduce the emotional and cognitive load that comes with job loss.”
Among the prompts that Turnbull suggested could be used include asking an LLM to act as a career coach and ask it what kinds of jobs one could pivot to, asking it to reformat a resume to be suitable for different fields in the gaming industry, and even asking the LLM to act as emotional support.
“I’m struggling with imposter syndrome after being laid off,” reads the emotional support prompt suggested by Turnbull. “Can you help me reframe this experience in a way that reminds me what I’m good at?”
As Sheffield himself also points out in a later post, Turnbull mentioning that those being hit by lay-offs should use the same kinds of AI tools that companies are trying to replace their employees with comes off as a bit tone deaf. This is likely a big reason why Turnbull got a fair bit of backlash, resulting in him taking down his post.
“Something I’ve realised over time is people in general lack the ability to think in a broader scope and include context and eventualities,” posted the Necrosoft director. “But after thousands of people get laid off from your company maybe don’t suggest they turn to the thing you’re trying to replace them with for solace.”
Reports of Microsoft being hit with lay-offs across all of its divisions, including Xbox, came in earlier this week. As part of the move, studios like Candy Crush developer King is expected to lose 200 employees. Forza Motorsport developer Turn 10 is stated to be the hardest hit studio, having lost almost 50 percent of its workforce.
In an internal note, Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer wrote about how the lay-offs were being done “to position Gaming for enduring success and allow us to focus on strategic growth areas.”
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 Sheffield (@brandon.insertcredit.com) 2025-07-04T03:48:10.841Z
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