Google has laid off 10 per cent of its managerial staff as part of a long-running campaign to increase efficiency by double that number. As per report, CEO Sundar Pichai recently revealed in an all-hands meeting that the company has slashed 10% of its managerial roles, including directors and VPs. The company is trimming its workforce, sharpening focus amid rising AI competition from rivals like OpenAI, threatening its search dominance.Google responded by introducing generative AI features in its products and the launch this month of Gemini 2.0, its most advanced AI model to date. Pichai said the new model would herald "a new agentic era" with AI models designed to understand and make decisions about the world.
The latest round of layoffs happened on Wednesday and it seems like a lot of managers and VPs had to say goodbye. While some roles were shifted to individual contributor positions, others were completely cut. A Google spokesperson told the Business Insider that some employees whose positions had been cut would be "transitioned to individual contributor roles", while some others were "role eliminations". The layoff saga started back in 2022 when Google's CEO, Sundar Pichai, announced a plan to make the company 20% more efficient. Last year, the restructuring resulted in a huge layoff affecting more than 12,000 employees.
In the same meeting, Pichai also spoke about a transformation of the corporate culture and the need to redefine its "Googleyness" - an amorphic term that has meant many things over the years, but is commonly understood as expressing what Google looks for in potential hires. He spoke about the importance of prioritising the company's mission, creating helpful products, taking bold risks, maintaining a scrappy attitude, and fostering a collaborative work environment.
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