The Gloomy Layoff Season And The Rainbow Ahead

By Ashwini Nathany

Posted on November 14, 2022

Within days of taking over Twitter, Elon musk laid off 50% of its staff. Not far behind was Meta cutting off 11000 jobs. The tech industry has seen a string of layoffs this year in the face of uncertain economic conditions. Spending cutbacks on digital advertising due to rising inflation and the resulting decline in revenues have forced companies to take drastic measures in order to cut their losses and build  leaner and efficient companies. We have witnessed massive layoffs this year due to the fears of a looming recession and rising interest rates.

Meta had about 11000 job cuts due to the massive losses of over 9 billion in its Reality Labs division so far this year.  Twitter had 3700 job cuts due to a daily loss of over 4 million. 

Lyft the rideshare app announced 700 job cuts citing a probable recession sometime in the next year. Stripe, the online payments giant cited similar reasons for the 1100 job cuts.

Coinbase and Shopify cut over 1000 jobs each along with Microsoft. Closer to home we have been seeing rampant job cuts from early this year. Cognizant and Accenture had massive job cuts citing failed background checks and forged documents. However these companies have not announced a hiring freeze at the moment.

The maximum layoffs this year were  in the edtech companies like Byju’s, Unacademy, Vedantu and WhiteHat Jr. The edtech startup Unacademy fired 17 per cent of its employees in April this year, while Byju’s fired the most number of employees in 2022. 

Udaan, a B2B eCommerce platform has laid off 350 jobs in order to attain profitability. One of India’s leading Fintech companies based in Bangaluru, Clear is another prominent name that has joined the list of companies laying off their employees in 2022. 

These layoffs have shocked the business world  as the layoffs are in thousands..  Post pandemic the retail mega giant Amazon fired 100000 warehouse employees as they were overstaffed. There are varied reasons for companies to take such harsh actions. Some of the obvious reasons for this current spree of layoffs are:

1. Rising inflation
2. Higher interest rates
3. Post pandemic adjustments
4. Russia invading Ukraine
5. Slowdown of funding in the startup world
6. Company restructuring and modernisation for efficiency

Some companies  like Meta, Twitter and Google have announced a hiring freeze. Softbank which has recorded quarterly losses of 23 billion is soon going to follow this trend of layoffs. For the past 15 years companies have been drunk on a hiring spree. What we are seeing now is a course correction of sorts. 

 Post pandemic this is a grim scenario of the business world. There is however a rainbow ahead in the form of some industries that are hiring and are expected to grow rapidly in the years ahead. Industries like Health Care, Entertainment, Food & Hospitality, Tourism, Beauty & Wellness, Real Estate etc are all growing at a quick pace.

According to ResumeBuilder the most coveted jobs are in the below fields.

1. Advertising and marketing
2. Computer and information technology
3. Health care 
4. Business and finance 
5. Retail
6. Food and hospitality 
7. Education
8. Arts and entertainment
9. Office and administrative support 
10. Community and social services 

Amid the reopening of industries across the spectrum, many Indian companies are hiring. Companies like  Infosys, TCS, Amex, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Barclays, Morgan Stanley, HSBC, Standard Chartered, Goldman Sachs, Accenture, Bajaj finserv Health etc are all increasing their head count.

During the Lay off-season highly skilled are expected to retain their jobs in the IT industry. It is very important to keep up skilling yourself with the latest technologies and areas of critical resource shortage.

Entry-level jobs are going to be difficult for a while and if you are just completing your graduation it is better to look forward to joining some masters course until the markets become normal.

The global information technology market grew from $8,384.32 billion in 2021 to $9,358.51 billion in 2022 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11.6%. The growth numbers of 2022-23 are expected to be lower than 5% and the major impact will be for service-based companies which are majorly into outsourcing.

Those of us who are victims of this current situation need to take a pause but then bounce back. Yes take the time to accept the situation, grieve if need be but then lookout for the inevitable rainbow that will appear after a spurt of rain.  For this you need to ensure that you stay connected with your network, update your resume and professional profile. List out your accomplishments and decide what you want. Tap on the connections you have and put it out that you are looking for a job. While you are waiting, learn something new relating to your field of expertise or a general life skill. I promise better times are ahead of us as companies need you! As Ratan Tata said “It is impossible to survive as a company if one is not sensitive to its people,”

The Gloomy Layoff Season And The Rainbow Ahead