Xbox workers are reportedly critical of how new CEO Asha Sharma is managing the company, accusing her of being overly focused on what people say on social media.

This comes courtesy of Chris Dring from The Game Business, who shared what he has heard from his sources at Xbox. On the whole, it appears that few have faith in Asha Sharma's strategies and question where she is getting her advice.

Xbox Workers Say They Have Little Faith In Asha Sharma's Strategy, And Doubt Gears Of War Will Be A System-Seller

"Numerous people I have spoken to at Xbox feel there's too much listening to Twitter," Dring says. "With the component crisis and overall market decline in console players, why is Xbox choosing to reinvest in consoles? Why is that the focus?"

Dring's sources suggest this is because Sharma is chasing the approval of fans on social media. They imply this is why we're seeing Gears of War: E-Day go console exclusive - something they have little faith in. "The people I spoke with have low expectations that Gears of War is going to have any real impact on hardware sales," he says. "They point out that Xbox has tried this before. They've tried to rejuvenate Halo, they've tried to rejuvenate Gears and they tried to develop a mega game in Perfect Dark. What's going to be different this time?"

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It isn't just social media that Sharma is said to be leaning on with her decision-making: "Certain studio heads feel Sharma is listening too much to consultants and analysts and not enough to the people actually building the games." Due to this, it's said that Sharma is prioritising speed above all else, which doesn't work particularly well when all of Xbox's big IPs will take years to get new games out

Right now, we're all just waiting to hear which studios will be caught up in Xbox's layoffs. Dring had claimed that Obsidian is having to negotiate with Xbox to avoid closure, but Bloomberg's Jason Schreier has pushed back on this. Indeed, if Sharma cares about what Twitter says about Xbox, this would be a disastrous move on the PR front.

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