Zuckerberg Holds Emotional Meeting As Thousands Of Employees Prepare For Layoffs

The tech industry is bracing for another round of massive layoffs, and this one could be the biggest one at a single company so far. According to The Wall Street Journal, Meta is planning to start the sacking process starting tomorrow, but executives have already been informed about the internal restructuring.

The company will reportedly make an official internal announcement at 6 a.m. (ET), and it will be followed by managers reaching out to their respective teams about workforce reduction plans. Meta employees that face the axe will reportedly get four months of salary as a severance, at the very least. 

Hearing from some employees who'd like to know which organizations are getting hit. Beyond recruiting seeing cuts, it's broad, and definitely includes some integrity-type work.

I'd like to figure out details, too, but managers and directors are your better bet.

— Jeff Horwitz (@JeffHorwitz) November 8, 2022

In comparison, Twitter initiated its termination bloodbath a few days ago, shrinking its workforce to nearly half of the original headcount. Unhappy with the treatment they got, a few employees are dragging the company to court over violations of labor laws. Meta's lay-offs will reportedly run far deeper, going by the sheer number of people that will soon lose their jobs. 

As per the report, Meta's recruiting and business departments will be the worst hit, while the Reality Labs division tasked with building the metaverse ecosystem and the video-focused social media divisions will be facing the least heat. Meta is not the only social media titan planning lay-offs though. TikTok began layoffs back in July, Snap announced a 20% workforce reduction in August, while Apple is mulling slow hiring, as well.

Ahead of the massive terminations planned at Meta, CEO Mark Zuckerberg reportedly told in a meeting that "he was accountable for the company's missteps, and that his over-optimism about growth had led to overstaffing." To recall, Zuckerberg's metaverse ambitions have resulted in Facebook bleeding billions of dollars each year, while the stock continues to be on a downward spiral. 

The rest of the divisions are not doing too well either, as Apple's moves have hurt ad revenues while social media competition had Meta losing daily active users for the first time in the company's history. Zuckerberg's apology sounds eerily similar to what Twitter co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey recently posted about the massive layoffs at Twitter under its new chief Elon Musk. 

Dorsey noted that he takes the responsibility for the messy employment situation at Twitter, especially in the face of a looming recession risk. "I grew the company size too quickly. I apologize for that," he added, almost as if it was a template for Zuckerberg's own apology.

Musk, on the other hand, wasn't so apologetic. Soon after employees started getting locked out of Twitter systems, the billionaire tweeted that "there is no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day." Embarrassingly, Twitter soon started reaching out to a few of the fired employees, asking if they would be interested in a comeback.