It’s been a turbulent few years for Meta and it looks set to continue as its CEO warns “low performers” that their jobs are on the line.
Mark Zuckerberg has announced plans to slash 5% of the company’s worldwide workforce to prepare for what he is warning will be “an intense year”.
The Meta CEO has made some drastic changes to the company’s working practices already this year, getting rid of third-party moderation in a move that pleased Donald Trump and his cronies; but has already fired up the authorities in the EU and UK.
Who Is Losing Their Job at Meta?
The memo detailing the upcoming cuts hasn’t been made public but was sent to staff and has been shared externally by insiders.
Bloomberg News was the first to alert to the cuts. BBC News followed suite and quotes Zuckerberg as writing: “This is going to be an intense year, and I want to make sure we have the best people on our teams.” He added: “I’ve decided to raise the bar on performance management and move out low performers faster.”
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He continued: “We typically manage out people who aren’t meeting expectations over the course of a year, but now we’re going to do more extensive performance-based cuts during this cycle.”
Although there are no details as to which teams will be impacted, the first cuts will be felt in the US, said the memo. Staff whose roles are at stake will be told by 10 February and they are being promised a “generous severance”. He also said that there would be some “backfilling” of roles later in the year.
Why More Cuts at Meta?
Well let’s face it, it’s not just Meta that’s letting people go. There have been hundreds of thousands of jobs lost in the tech industry in recent years.
Meta’s large-scale cuts kicked off in November 2023 with the most dramatic lay-offs in the company’s history. Around 11,000 employees lost their jobs, which amounted to 13% of the workforce; and the C-Suite weren’t finished there with more cuts announced in March 2024.
These latest cuts come as Zuckerberg continues to pump resources into AI technology development and has his eyes firmly fixed on competitors.
In a July 2024 letter, Zuckerberg stated, “This year, Llama 3 is competitive with the most advanced models and leading in some areas. Starting next year, we expect future Llama models to become the most advanced in the industry.” But this comes with huge expense.
Trump’s Rocky Relationship with Meta
These cuts also mark the start of a four year term for a president the Meta CEO has had a notoriously rocky relationship with. Trump was even banned from Facebook after the riots at The Capitol.
Zuckerberg may be on better terms with Donald Trump after his decision on monitoring – oh and the $1 million he made to the inauguration fund – but he is now facing the ire of authorities in the EU. And this might mean fines.
Like many tech companies, he might be slimming down his workforce to cut costs in anticipation of this, to raise funds for R&D but also because the economic climate continues to be rocky.
