If you work for Microsoft you might want to start revising your resume, and dust off your good ol’ interview attire, as the tech behemoth is looking to make some changes in the company — changes that will begin with laying off 18,000 of their employees.
In a recent memo to his employees, new Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella hinted that major revisions were on the horizon saying, “Nothing is off the table in how we think about shifting our culture … Organizations will change … Tired traditions will be questioned. Our priorities will be adjusted …” This was followed by a new memo which marks the companies largest cuts in history, second to 5,800 cuts back in 2009. The new cuts will begin soon according to the new memo, he wrote “We are moving now to start reducing the first 13,000 positions, and the vast majority of employees whose jobs will be eliminated will be notified over the next six months.”
The majority of the layoffs, 12,500 to be exact, will come from Microsofts newest acquisition, Nokia. In fact toward the end of the memo, Nadella mentions that Microsoft will discontinue making Android smart phones through Nokia — which makes sense considering the company has its own Windows Phone operating system.
The layoffs aren’t a representation of financial issues within the company as Microsoft’s stock is up 1.45%, the highest it’s been in almost 14 years. According to Nadella, the cuts are “the first step to building the right organization for our ambitions is to realign our workforce.” With Microsoft having a total 127,104 employee across the globe, 15% of which are going to be laid off — let’s hope new jobs are part of these “ambitions”.
As for those laid off, Microsoft’s will have to dish out between $1.1 billion and $1.6 billion in severance and benefit packages.
Read the memo in full here.
You can find Khari Clarke at a bar in Williamsburg, or on Twitter (@KINGCLARKEIII).
