Microsoft has unleashed a new round of job cuts.
A report from GeekWire suggests that an “unknown number” of employees from customer service, support, and sales were affected by the layoffs. “Organizational and workforce adjustments are a necessary and regular part of managing our business. We will continue to prioritize and invest in strategic growth areas for our future and in support of our customers and partners,” the company wrote in a statement.
Earlier this year, Microsoft cut roughly 10,000 workers. “These are the kinds of hard choices we have made throughout our 47-year history to remain a consequential company in this industry that is unforgiving to anyone who doesn’t adapt to platform shifts,” Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella wrote in a note accompanying that news. The company wasn’t alone in unleashing layoffs; at around the same time, Salesforce, Meta, Twitter, Amazon, and numerous startups also eliminated thousands of jobs.
According to layoffs.fyi, which crowdsources its data, tech layoffs have steadily declined since that big company bloodbath at the beginning of 2023. Nonetheless, companies are continuing to cut back on headcount—in addition to Microsoft, notable tech names such as Stripe, Waze, Robinhood, Uber, Grubhub, and 23andMe have all eliminated employees in recent weeks.
That’s partially a consequence of the business cycle: as these companies head into their next fiscal year, they’re making headcount adjustments as part of their broader strategies. It’s also the fallout from a pandemic-era hiring glut within many tech companies, which plowed a massive spike in profits from cloud-based services into talent acquisition. Widespread fears of an economic contraction have impacted many of these companies’ bottom lines, leading them to readjust their teams and projects.
Meanwhile, the tech unemployment rate hit 2.3 percent in June, according to the latest data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS)—notably lower than the national unemployment rate of 3.6 percent. Organizations across multiple industries need tech professionals for a variety of roles.
