Meta to fire non-engineering employees in the coming weeks

Layoff season isn't over yet for Facebook-owned social media company Meta. After firing more than 11,000 employees in 2022, Meta plans multiple rounds of layoffs in the coming months. According to the Wall Street Journal report, the upcoming layoffs could match last year's 13 per cent job cuts. The report further mentions that non-engineering roles will be affected this time.

The Wall Street Journal report says that the layoffs will be announced in several rounds and will be around the same size as the 13 per cent cut to its workforce last year. Among other roles, Meta is likely to eliminate more non-engineering roles and is expected to shut down some projects and teams. Last year, Meta laid off around 11,000 jobs or 13% of its employees. The new cuts are expected to be the same proportion as those remaining.

The report further notes that some wearables that Reality Labs developed, Meta's hardware and metaverse division, will also get shut down. This suggests Meta is moving away from popularizing augmented and virtual reality products in the near term, although research in this area will continue for the long term. The first round of layoffs may be announced next week, and the total number of cuts during the second quarter is still unclear.

On Thursday at the Morgan Stanley 2023 Technology, Media & Telecom Conference, Meta Chief Financial Officer Susan Li said, "We're continuing to look across the company, across both Family of Apps and Reality Labs, and really evaluate we are deploying our resources toward the highest leverage opportunities. This will result in us making some tough decisions to wind down projects in some places, to shift resources away from some teams."

Earlier, Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg said 2023 would be the year of efficiency. He also hinted that some projects in Meta will be shut down.

Earlier, the WSJ reported that Meta employees received a low rating during their performance review. Meta gave about 10 per cent of employees a "complies with most" rating, which is the company's second-lowest rating. The lowest rating, "meets some," is not something the company gives out often enough. The ratings were apparently given to incentivize high-quality work and long-term thinking, according to a company spokesperson.