by Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, has announced that it plans to cut around 10,000 jobs worldwide, just four months after cutting 11,000 workers.
The group’s founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, told employees on a company blog that Meta also plans to cut about 5,000 job openings as part of its “Year Of Efficiency” push to cut costs and restructure the company.
Meta will first reduce the size of its recruiting team, with staff in that department expected to be told on Wednesday where the cuts will be made, followed by layoffs in their technology groups in late April, before focusing on roles in their lines of business in late May.
Mr Zuckerberg said: “This is going to be tough and there is no way around it.
“It means saying goodbye to talented and passionate colleagues who have been part of our success.”
It follows Meta’s announcement last November that it would cut 11,000 jobs from its 87,000 global workforce.
These cuts were expected to mean the loss of up to 650 jobs in the UK and around 350 jobs at risk in Ireland.
But Meta said on Tuesday it would not provide a breakdown of where the latest job cuts would take place globally.
Mr. Zuckerberg said: “I have said that part of our work will involve downsizing – and that will serve both to build a leaner, more technical company and to improve our business performance to achieve our long-term vision.”
The California-based company last month posted lower earnings for the final three months of 2022 after being hit by a slump in the online advertising market, greater economic woes and increasing competition from rivals like TikTok.
Mr Zuckerberg warned it would face trade pressures for “many years”.
“I think we should prepare for the possibility that this new economic reality will continue for many years to come.
“Higher interest rates mean the economy runs leaner, more geopolitical instability means more volatility, and more regulation means slower growth and higher costs of innovation. With this prospect, we need to work more efficiently than we did during our previous downsizing to ensure success.”
Meta joins a slew of competitors including Microsoft, Amazon and Google-owner Alphabet that are shedding their workforces amid fears of a slowdown in demand if the U.S. and global economy slows.
Google’s parent company said in January it was laying off 12,000 employees, just days after software giant Microsoft announced it would cut about 10,000 employees.
Mr Zuckerberg said he hopes to complete the final job cuts “as soon as possible in the year so that we can get through this period of uncertainty and focus on the critical work”, but also warned that it could take until the end of the year to make any changes in some areas of the company.
He added that the company plans to lift the hiring and transfer freezes in each business group once the restructuring is complete.
As part of the changes, the group plans to cut management layers to “flatten” the organization, turning a number of managers “into individual contributors.”
Meta will also report on its analysis of hybrid working in the summer, but urged employees to “find more ways to collaborate face-to-face with your colleagues” as they believe that “face-to-face time helps build relationships and get more done “.
