Meta Layoffs: Partnerships And Marketing Divisions To Be Hit Hard, Report Says

Meta's new wave of layoffs this week is expected to largely affect employees under partnerships and marketing divisions, a new report revealed. CEO Mark Zuckerberg previously said business teams at the Menlo Park-based company will be affected in a late May layoff round.

The partnerships unit is expected to be hit harder than other divisions in this round of layoffs, two people familiar with the company told Insider Tuesday. The partnerships workforce could reportedly be cut by half or more.

Nick Grudin, Meta's vice president of partnerships, is reportedly leading the restructuring at the division.

The sources further revealed that marketing is also expected to be hit hard by the layoffs that were previously reported to start Wednesday.

A spokesperson for Meta declined to comment on the report, as per Insider.

Lori Goler, Meta's chief of human resources, confirmed that layoffs were coming Wednesday, as per an internal memo viewed by The Washington Post.

At least six current and former Meta employees who have worked on the company's trust and safety units told the Post that widespread headcount reductions in affected divisions could impede the company's efforts against political misinformation, foreign campaigns and even regulatory constraints.

The workers told the outlet that there are concerns the layoffs could make Meta platforms WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook more dangerous at a time when geopolitical issues are on the rise.

This week's layoffs are expected to affect more than 5,000 workers after the social media giant eliminated 4,000 jobs last month in a second round of layoffs that hit technology teams.

The second layoff wave hit WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram and Reality Labs, sources told Vox. At the time, workers in North America were reportedly asked to work from home if possible to give affected workers "space to process the news."

Nick Clegg, Meta president of global affairs, reportedly told employees during a Q&A session last week that the third round of layoffs would affect "everybody in the biz teams, including my orgs," as per a recording of the meeting obtained by Vox.

"It's just a time of great anxiety and uncertainty. ... I wish I could have some easy way or providing solace or comfort. It is uncertain," he said.

In mid-March, Zuckerberg said the company was looking to reduce Meta's workforce "by around 10,000 people." He said restructurings were expected in tech groups in late April "and then our business groups in late May."

Zuckerberg also said at the time that the company would close around 5,000 open positions that weren't filled. The company will lift hiring "and transfer freezes in each group" after the widespread restructuring, he added.

"We will support people in the same ways we have before and treat everyone with the gratitude they deserve," the tech titan said about the affected employees.

The first round of mass layoffs at Meta took place in November wherein more than 11,000 roles were eliminated.

"I want to take accountability for these decisions and for how we got here. I know this is tough for everyone, and I'm especially sorry to those impacted," Zuckerberg said at the time.

This week's layoffs at Meta are expected to push the total number of tech jobs lost this year so far beyond 200,000. As of Tuesday, 699 tech companies have eliminated 198,985 jobs since the beginning of 2023, according to data from the layoffs tracker layoffs.fyi.

Meta is just one of the huge tech companies that admitted to over-hiring during the pandemic, CNN reported. Amazon, Microsoft, Google and Meta were the big tech giants that hired thousands of workers during the pandemic. Post-COVID, it appears that tech companies misjudged growth levels as people returned to their regular offline routines, resulting in mass layoffs.

Meanwhile, the Facebook owner continues to face external pressure as it grapples with European regulatory challenges.

On Monday, the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) slapped a record fine of 1.2 billion euros ($1.3 billion) on Meta over the transfer of European user data to the United States.

The DPC, after about three years of investigating Meta Ireland's transfer of data, found that the company failed to "address the risks to the fundamental rights and freedoms of data subjects."