12,000 Meta employees are likely to lose their jobs amid ‘quiet layoffs’

Meta is reportedly conducting quiet layoffs at Facebook that may lead to thousands of job cuts of at least 12,000 or 15% of its workforce.

According to a report, the senior executives are in the process of executing the quiet layoffs of underperforming workers. An employee said, “It might look like they are moving on, but the reality is they are being forced out.”

The executives have reportedly told directors across the company to select at least 15% of their team to be labelled as “needs support”. These employees will be put on a performance improvement plan and eventually let go.

Meta Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has said that the social network is freezing hiring across the board, warning that more layoffs are in the pipeline. Zuckerberg mentioned, “Our plan is to steadily reduce headcount growth over the next year. Many teams are going to shrink so we can shift energy to other areas.”

Facebook’s parent company Meta is currently reducing staff to cut costs amid the economic downturn, apparently putting some of them on traditional 30 to 60 days “lists” to find a new role within the company or leave.

Admitting that the social network has entered an economic downturn that will have a broad impact on the digital advertising business, Zuckerberg said that many “teams are going to shrink so we can shift energy to other areas inside the company.”