Meta (Facebook) lays off employees across multiple teams

Multiple teams at Meta were hit by layoffs on Wednesday, the company confirmed in a statement to TechCrunch, noting these changes were made to reallocate resources within the company. “Today, a few teams at Meta are making changes to ensure resources are aligned with their long-term strategic goals and location strategy,” said a Meta spokesperson in an emailed statement. “This includes moving some teams to different locations, and moving some employees to different roles. In situations like this when a role is eliminated, we work hard to find other opportunities for impacted employees.” Employees working on Reality Labs, Instagram, and WhatsApp were affected by the layoffs, according to The Verge.

One of the employees affected by Wednesday’s lay off   is Jane Manchun Wong, a software engineer who was hired to join Instagram in 2023 after becoming known for revealing unannounced features coming to Meta apps.At the time, her appointment was celebrated by Meta’s CTO, Andrew Bosworth, and the head Instagram, Adam Mosseri. Other former Meta employees also took to social media to announce they were laid off. Employees who previously worked on Facebook, recruiting, legal operations, and design said they had been laid off on Wednesday in social media posts viewed by TechCrunch.

A Meta spokesperson tells TechCrunch that Threads, recruiting, and legal operations were not impacted by the reorganisation and there were no layoffs there. Meta declined to comment on the record about how many employees were affected and what orgs they were part of. One former Meta employee, who worked in one of these organisations, tells TechCrunch that some employees were offered different positions under new contracts, or told they could take a severance package instead. Several took the severance package, according to the source.The former employee tells TechCrunch that more than a dozen people on their team were notified that their roles were affected via video calls on Wednesday. Some employees affected on Wednesday received six weeks of severance pay, according to the former Meta employee. (The employee spoke to TechCrunch on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitive matter.) In addition, mirroring a rumour circulating on the workplace app Blind,the Financial Times reported that some employees were fired for using their $25 meal credits to buy non-food items, like household needs. In recent years, Meta has laid off a large amount of its workforce to rightsize the company following aggressive pandemic hiring. In 2022, Meta laid off roughly 13 per cent of its workforce, or 11,000 employees, for which CEO Mark Zuckerberg personally took responsibility. In 2023, Meta laid off another 10,000 employee and withdrew 5,000 open roles it had yet to fill.