The job cuts in the tech industry are growing – as tech giants adjust to a new reality.
In a series of layoffs in 2023, more than 46000 employees were let go by US-based tech companies. This number includes 10,000 job cuts from Microsoft and 12,000 from Google's parent company Alphabet. However, amid tech layoffs and a hiring freeze due to the looming fear of an economic downturn, several companies are hiring for multiple roles currently.
To help the affected employees from recent layoffs find the best opportunities, I am creating a list of companies (+ emails) currently hiring for thousands of open roles globally. Stay in touch…
But why are employees being laid off in massive numbers?
Experts have cited various reasons that are leading to the mass job cuts:
Fear of Recession: As experts warn of recession amid high inflation and rising interest rates, companies are reassessing their spending and bracing for a potential slowdown in growth.
Culture of Overzealous Hiring: Tech companies that saw strong revenue growth during the Covid pandemic went on a hiring spree to increase the size of their workforce. However, as they faced the post-pandemic reality (market conditions), the same companies had to resort to massive job cuts.
Alphabet CEO, Sundar Pichai, announced the job cuts via email. In the email, he wrote; “Over the past two years, we have seen periods of dramatic growth. To match and fuel that growth, we hired for a different economic reality than the one we face today.”
Alphabet’s Google added around 38000 employees to its roster from 2019 to the end of 2021, reaching a headcount of 156,500. Google now fired around 12,000 of its workforce.
Microsoft hired 40,000 people from June 2021 to June 2022; it now laid off 10,000 employees last week.
Meta hired more than 27,000 employees in 2020 and 2021. It slashed its workforce by 13%, around 11,000 in November 2022.
Luckily, Apple hasn’t announced any layoffs yet. Maybe it got lost while using Apple Maps, but it remains the only big tech company without cutting its workforce. One factor, reports suggest, that helped Apple dodge the layoffs is that it hired far more methodically than Google, Facebook, and Microsoft.
3. Pressure From Investors: Some tech companies are facing massive pressure from investors to adopt a more aggressive strategy to curb spending and preserve capital. Therefore, to cut costs, companies are letting go of workers in huge numbers.
Despite all the tech layoffs, several companies are hiring across tech and leadership roles. I am creating a list of companies that are hiring. Let me know if you want the full list (all details + emails).
Signing off.