• Meta has reportedly decided to freeze all hiring and would like to further reduce its workforce. Times are tough for everyone.

As is the case in many other industries, the tech sector is impacted by the slowdown in the global economy this year. Meta is not immune. Back in May, reports suggested the company would slow the pace of new hires this year. Today, Bloomberg reports that Meta would have frozen all hiring.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg also reportedly told employees there would most likely be more restructuring and downsizing. “I had hoped the economy would have stabilized more today, but from what we can see it hasn’t yet, so we have to tread carefully,” Mark Zuckerberg reportedly told employees.

The company plans to cut the budgets of the majority of its teams, according to Bloomberg. Mark Zuckerberg should let his various team managers manage the workforce. Among the measures taken, there would be internal reassignments and the departures would not be replaced.

Meta declined to comment on statements by Bloomberg. The company contenting itself with referring to the statements made by Mark Zuckerberg during the presentation of the financial results of Meta last July: “Given the current trend, it is even more a question of refocusing than during the last quarter”, declared then Mark Zuckerberg. “Our objective is to regularly reduce the workforce over the next year. Many teams are going to be reduced so that we can focus all of our energy on other areas, and I wanted to give our managers the ability to decide within their teams where to step up, where to address attrition and where to restructure teams while minimizing the impact on long-term initiatives.”

In its financial report, Meta revealed that, during the second quarter, its revenues had fallen by 1% compared to last year. This is the first time the company has recorded a loss of revenue.

Times are hard

This hiring freeze is consistent with a report last week that suggested Meta was pushing some employees out rather than waging an outright layoff campaign. In July, we learned that the company was asking team leaders to identify “worst performing” employees, to prepare for a possible downsizing. The American giant has also reduced costs on other fronts, by putting an end to the solicitation of many contract workers and by abandoning certain projects, in particular within its Meta Reality Labs division, including a smartwatch project with a dual camera.

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