You may have heard about how the tech industry is going through some major changes. These tech companies are significantly downsizing and laying off employees to preserve their profit. This happened because, during the 2020 pandemic, it witnessed a massive boom which created a huge demand for the companies.
In order to keep up with the demand, the companies had to hire a significant number of employees. This meant that companies with a steady demand and a workforce managed to prevail. However, when COVID-19 cases started to drop, and people started returning to their normal lives, there was also a significant drop in the demand for the tech industry.
Thereafter, they were left with a huge workforce and low demand. So in order to keep their profits and sustain their business, companies are left with no choice but to lay off employees. Even tech giants like Microsoft have laid off around 10,000 employees.
Keep on reading to know more about the tech industry’s biggest company and its attempt to save face.
Cutting Ties
The sudden focus shift towards reducing the workforce in the tech industry adds up to affecting 5% of the workers and costs $1.2 billion in reorganization and severance costs. The chief executive of Microsoft, Satya Nadella, stated that customer spending had increased during the COVID-19 times, and now it has reduced since people are ‘exercising caution’.
Nadella continued mentioning that it is not closing off hiring entirely. Instead, the company will focus on engaging people in specific key areas. The chief executive had broken the news to the staff in a memo and claimed that people were not wholly blindsided since many parts of the world are currently dealing with a recession.
He continued and mentioned that there is a silver lining which is the new wave of computing; artificial intelligence.
A New Opportunity
Because of this new door of opportunity, Microsoft is looking into a multi-billion dollar investment in an artificial intelligence company called OpenAI, the one that developed ChatGPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer), as per the Financial Times.
Not The Last Time
Despite the popular assumption, this series of layoffs will not be the last one. Tech giants are looking to tighten their belts further while dealing with post-pandemic times when people have reduced their spending on digital platforms.
Unfortunately, Microsoft isn’t the only one, it is companies like Amazon and Meta that have laid off thousands of employees while shutting warehouses across the country in hopes of reducing their spending.
Experts believe that people working in the tech industry should start looking into particular skills and engineering experience in data science and artificial intelligence to help them secure stable jobs and boost their prospects for the future.
This tech industry situation is scary and life-changing for many people.