The layoff announcements coming lately from the chief executive officers of big technology companies all contain variations on the theme of “we hired too many people during the pandemic,” expressed with varying degrees of contrition.
At one end of the spectrum are Seattleites Andy Jassy of Amazon.com Inc. and Satya Nadella of Microsoft Corp. Amazon’s layoffs were simply an outgrowth of its annual review, Jassy wrote, although he did allow that “this year’s review has been more difficult given the uncertain economy and that we’ve hired rapidly over the last several years.” Microsoft’s Nadella opted for bland corporatespeak: “As we saw customers accelerate their digital spend during the pandemic, we’re now seeing them optimize their digital spend to do more with less.”
