The CEO has divided LinkedIn with his heartfelt post (Pictures: Linkedin / Braden Wallake)

A business owner and CEO who posted a picture on LinkedIn of himself crying after firing staff has come in for some fierce criticism.

Braden Wallake uploaded the tearful selfie alongside a post explaining he had to sack staff from his business-to-business marketing agency Hyper Social.

He described it as the ‘most vulnerable thing’ he will ‘ever share’ after he made two members of staff redundant.

Both former employees were ‘over-the-top nice’ about it, he said. They also ‘assured’ him and his business partner they were ‘going to be okay.’

The post has since gone viral, with many LinkedIn users criticising Wallake for posting about the situation on the workplace social network, rather than doing something to change it.

Wallake, from Colombus, Ohio in the United States, then posted a follow-up to explain he was not trying to ‘victimise’ himself.

Braden Wallake described the post as the most ‘vulnerable thing I’ll ever share’ (Credit: LinkedIn)

‘Hey everyone, yes, I am the crying CEO. No, my intent was not to make it about me or victimize myself,’ he wrote on Wednesday, August 10.