Home » Employment News » Facebook to freeze hiring as company focuses on “bringing the metaverse to life”

Facebook to freeze hiring as company focuses on “bringing the metaverse to life”

By Nagasunder in Employment News, posted May 6, 2022

Facebook is halting hiring and reducing plans to hire new employees across the board.

Business Insider reports CFO David Wehner said the company's rebranding to Meta is part of a "reprioritization" as it addresses difficulties that caused it to miss revenue projections.

Facebook's global head of recruiting, Miranda Kalinowski, stated in a second memo that the company's engineering team would be the first to be affected by these hiring decisions, while management continues to alter hiring targets elsewhere.

Facebook's employment freeze is unusual

The last time the company did something similar was at the start of the pandemic it was scrambling to put in place new hire onboarding processes, according to a former employee.

Earlier this week, a Meta spokesperson told Insider the company "regularly re-evaluates" its hiring and "according to our business needs and in light of the expense guidance given for this earnings period, we are slowing its growth accordingly."

"We will continue to grow our workforce to ensure we focus on long-term impact," the spokesperson added.

Facebook was attempting to "bring the metaverse to life," but the corporation was under pressure from unforeseen reasons such as the Ukraine conflict, data-privacy concerns, and the relaxation of pandemic prohibitions.

Facebook changed its corporate name to Meta last year to reflect its new focus on building its virtual "metaverse."

Reality Labs, the division within Facebook that oversees the development of the metaverse, lost $2.9 billion in the first quarter as a result of the project.

Wehner wrote in his message on May 4 that: "bringing the metaverse to life" is a new development area for Meta, along with other prospects like selling content through Instagram's new Reels feature and expanding its business messaging function.

"But we also have to be responsible by responding to the unpredictable market forces that have put pressure on our business over the past few months," he continued.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Apple's modifications to privacy settings on its iOS operating system last year, and a weaker macroeconomic climate were all factors that harmed Facebook's ability to generate income, he said.

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Wehner also noted that as economies reopen after COVID-related lockdowns, "more people are spending time offline and returning to pre-pandemic spending patterns." That's causing an "industry-wide downturn," he said.

In a separate memo, Facebook's global head of recruiting, Miranda Kalinowski, said: ”Engineering will be the first to be impacted by the freeze, while other roles and units can continue to hire actively”

Engineering teams will be the first to be affected by the changes.

Kalinowski highlighted which engineering levels and roles will be affected in her note. Most of the positions are mid-level to director-level, according to the memo.

Beyond engineering, however, Kalinowski and Wehner said they're "still working out" what the hiring freeze means for other teams.

However, they confirmed"This will affect almost every team in the company," they said.

Reality Labs will be unaffected at first.

"Recruiting goals will swing to other hiring priorities across Product XFN, Reality Labs, and Infra," Kalinowski stated.

Source: Business Insider

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