Friday, January 20th 2023

Google to Lay Off Around 12,000 Staff to "Set up for the Future"

Google's chief executive officer (CEO) Sundar Pichai today uploaded a blog post titled "A difficult decision to set us up for the future." This message highlights the decision to lay off around 12,000 working staff from Google's fleet of employees. That includes the US and international teams represented in the figure mentioned above. While we don't have information about the specific headcount deficit per country, US employees are expected to be hit first and international employees second, as the company has to comply with local state laws in which it employs the staff. The figure represents about 6% of its total staff. Given the recent economic climate and a slight downturn in tech, Google is joining other big companies in cutting head counts to adapt to the new economy. Below you can read a piece of Google's announcement.
Sundar PichaiI have some difficult news to share. We've decided to reduce our workforce by approximately 12,000 roles. We've already sent a separate email to employees in the US who are affected. In other countries, this process will take longer due to local laws and practices. This will mean saying goodbye to some incredibly talented people we worked hard to hire and have loved working with. I'm deeply sorry for that. The fact that these changes will impact the lives of Googlers weighs heavily on me, and I take full responsibility for the decisions that led us here.
The rest of the announcement can be read in the Google blog post.
Source: Google Blog
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53 Comments on Google to Lay Off Around 12,000 Staff to "Set up for the Future"

#51
The Von Matrices
Prima.VeraGo f..k yourself hypocrite. This p.o.s. should be the one to quit first if is his responsibilities to play with the lives of 12k people.
Those rich bastards have no more common sense and they thing they can just play with other people lives as they see fit.
Are they overpaid? Yes, no dispute there. However, with my own experience of owning a business, hiring employees, and then also needing to layoff some employees during the recent downturn, hiring and layoffs are not some frivolous tasks that CEO's do on a whim.

One of my employees bluntly told me that it is my job as a CEO to keep him hired so that he can keep paying his own bills. We had a discussion, respectfully disagreed, and then went back to work. Yes, I believe that you can disagree with your boss and not get fired as long as you are doing your job.

It is not my job as CEO to ensure that people have money to pay their bills. That's the job of the government's social service programs. My job as CEO is to make sure the business survives downturns and optimizes profitability. The reason businesses hire employees is not for charity; it's to complete work that brings in more money for the business.

Also, what is not being said is that the people who are getting laid off are almost surely the least productive among the workforce and an economic downturn is a convenient excuse to get rid of them. And what you might not be aware of is that laying off employees is hardly free for a company. Places like California require a long advance notice of being terminated or else you have to pay for many additional weeks of that employee's salary. In other states you have to contribute to the unemployment insurance fund whose rates spike whenever you layoff an employee (similar to how any insurance has its rates increase when you make a claim.) These costs are meant to encourage employers to not layoff employees.

I can villify Google for many things, but I can't villify Google for laying off employees when the company can't financially justify keeping them hired. It's not personal; it's business.
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#52
claes
Or it’s just bad management. Like most tech companies, they overestimated the Covid boom and hired too many employees. Sure, execs are foregoing bonuses, but they’re also cutting employee pay across divisions.
Posted on Reply
#53
R-T-B
Why_MeIt's pretty simple tbh. The more money a country prints the more devaluation of said country's currency.
If you have a layman's understanding of it then yeah it is always going to appear simple.

It's not entirely wrong but there is a bit more to it than that as well.
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