Meta Platforms Inc is cutting about 5 percent of its staff through performance-based terminations and plans to hire new people to fill their roles this year, an internal memo sent to all employees said.
As of September last year, Meta employed about 72,000 people, so a 5 percent reduction could affect about 3,600 jobs.
“I’ve decided to raise the bar on performance management and move out low-performers faster,” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in the note posted to an internal message board and reviewed by Bloomberg News.
Photo: Reuters
“We typically manage out people who aren’t meeting expectations over the course of a year, but now we’re going to do more extensive performance-based cuts during this cycle,” he said.
Meta’s performance cycle is expected to wrap up next month, said a person familiar with the matter, who asked not to be identified discussing internal company procedures.
Affected workers in the US are expected to be notified on Feb. 10, while those based in other countries are to be informed at a later date, the memo said.
The terminations would only include staff who have been at the company long enough to be eligible for a performance review.
Zuckerberg told employees that the company would “provide generous severance” in line with past cuts.
Zuckerberg had declared 2023 the company’s “year of efficiency” and announced plans then to eliminate 10,000 positions. Now, he has taken on a different tone.
In a note to managers, he said that the performance-based cuts are aimed at ensuring the company has the “strongest talent” and is able to “bring new people in.”
Altogether, Meta expects its headcount to be down 10 percent by the end of the current performance cycle.
That total includes an additional 5 percent reduction from attrition last year, according to the message to managers.
The Menlo Park, California-based company that includes Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp would make headcount decisions for each organization based on their respective number of reductions last year.
Zuckerberg last week announced a series of changes at Meta, including disbanding US-based fact-checking on its platforms, ending many of its diversity and inclusion efforts, and changing its “hateful conduct” policy to allow more flexibility around language used to discuss immigrants, women, and transgender and nonbinary people.
In the note to staff, Zuckerberg said that he was positioning the company for what he expects to be an “intense year” focused on artificial intelligence, smart glasses and the future of social media.
Meta is not alone in making performance-based job cuts at the start of the new year. Last week, Business Insider reported that Microsoft Corp would be making job cuts targeting underperforming employees.
DIVIDED VIEWS: Although the Fed agreed on holding rates steady, some officials see no rate cuts for this year, while 10 policymakers foresee two or more cuts There are a lot of unknowns about the outlook for the economy and interest rates, but US Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell signaled at least one thing seems certain: Higher prices are coming. Fed policymakers voted unanimously to hold interest rates steady at a range of 4.25 percent to 4.50 percent for a fourth straight meeting on Wednesday, as they await clarity on whether tariffs would leave a one-time or more lasting mark on inflation. Powell said it is still unclear how much of the bill would fall on the shoulders of consumers, but he expects to learn more about tariffs
NOT JUSTIFIED: The bank’s governor said there would only be a rate cut if inflation falls below 1.5% and economic conditions deteriorate, which have not been detected The central bank yesterday kept its key interest rates unchanged for a fifth consecutive quarter, aligning with market expectations, while slightly lowering its inflation outlook amid signs of cooling price pressures. The move came after the US Federal Reserve held rates steady overnight, despite pressure from US President Donald Trump to cut borrowing costs. Central bank board members unanimously voted to maintain the discount rate at 2 percent, the secured loan rate at 2.375 percent and the overnight lending rate at 4.25 percent. “We consider the policy decision appropriate, although it suggests tightening leaning after factoring in slackening inflation and stable GDP growth,”
Meta Platforms Inc offered US$100 million bonuses to OpenAI employees in an unsuccessful bid to poach the ChatGPT maker’s talent and strengthen its own generative artificial intelligence (AI) teams, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has said. Facebook’s parent company — a competitor of OpenAI — also offered “giant” annual salaries exceeding US$100 million to OpenAI staffers, Altman said in an interview on the Uncapped with Jack Altman podcast released on Tuesday. “It is crazy,” Sam Altman told his brother Jack in the interview. “I’m really happy that at least so far none of our best people have decided to take them
As they zigzagged from one machine to another in the searing African sun, the workers were covered in black soot. However, the charcoal they were making is known as “green,” and backers hope it can save impoverished Chad from rampant deforestation. Chad, a vast, landlocked country of 19 million people perched at the crossroads of north and central Africa, is steadily turning to desert. It has lost more than 90 percent of its forest cover since the 1970s, hit by climate change and overexploitation of trees for household uses such as cooking, officials say. “Green charcoal” aims to protect what
RSS