LinkedIn to lay off 5% workers, read full memo here

LinkedIn, the professional networking platform, is set to reduce its workforce. In an internal memo, LinkedIn CEO Daniel Shapero stated that the company was also scaling back investments. LinkedIn has a global workforce of 17,500 employees.

In Short

• LinkedIn announces layoffs
• Reports indicate 875 jobs likely impacted globally
• LinkedIn CEO says multiple teams affected as company scales back spending

LinkedIn has become the latest tech company to announce layoffs. The Microsoft-owned platform is set to reduce roles across different teams, including engineering, and marketing, as explained in an internal memo. LinkedIn is said to have a global workforce of 17,500 employees.

In the memo, LinkedIn CEO Daniel Shapero stated that the reductions would affect a range of functions, including the Global Business Organisation, marketing, engineering and product. The memo also said LinkedIn would scale back spending on marketing campaigns, vendor spend, customer events and underutilised office space as it seeks to operate more profitably.

This comes at a time when LinkedIn’s parent company, Microsoft, has already laid off around 15,000 workers. The company has also offered voluntary exit options for its senior-most employees. Other companies including Meta and Amazon have also fired thousands of workers.

How many workers are losing their jobs at LinkedIn?

While Shapero did not specify the total number of job reductions, he stated that impacted employees will receive an email an hour after the memo. Do note that as per a Reuters report, LinkedIn may cut as many as 5 per cent of its total workforce. This would translate to 875 job losses.

Shapero did clarify that the impacted employees were in two regions – Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA), and Asia-Pacific (APAC).

Daniel Shapero stated that LinkedIn needed to “reinvent” how it works, with “agile teams focused” on highest priorities. According to the LinkedIn chief, the company needed to shift investments towards areas such as infrastructure to fulfill its long term mission and vision.

You can read the full memo below:

"Team,

Economic opportunity is one of the societal issues of our time, and Linkedin has been and will continue to be the platform that professionals and companies turn to as they navigate the changing world of work. For us to meet this moment, we must ready ourselves to deliver a step change in impact across our products, businesses, and platforms, while continuing to operate more profitably. We need to reinvent how we work, with agile teams focused on our highest priorities, and by shifting investments toward areas such as infrastructure to fulfill our mission and vision over the long term. This requires hard prioritization and tradeoffs.

Today I'm sharing the difficult decision that I, along with our leadership team, have made to reduce roles across GBO, Marketing, Engineering and Product. If you are impacted, or proposed to be impacted in EMEA & APAC, by these changes, you will receive a calendar invite to a notification meeting within the next hour. For impacted teams, you'll learn more about your org-specific information from your leaders shortly, and updates will be added to go/CompanyExchange throughout today.

In addition to role reductions, we are scaling back investments in some areas including marketing campaigns, vendor spend, customer events, and underutilized office space, so we can focus teams on priorities that have the broadest impact with the highest ROl. You will receive details about these changes from respective functional leaders.

I want to acknowledge and thank those who will be leaving Linkedin. You have helped build LinkedIn's culture and platform into what it is today, and I hope you are proud of the lasting impact your work will continue to have on our members, customers, and colleagues.

For those staying, first and foremost, I would like to invite you to support our impacted colleagues. We will move forward together with focus and clear priorities to reach our potential as the platform that the world's professionals and companies increasingly turn to.

Thank you, again, to our teammates who are departing, and to everyone across LinkedIn who continues to show up and support each other.

Dan

BCC: All Global Employees"

- Ends