Google CEO says staff cuts avoided 'much worse' issues

Google CEO Sundar Pichai, on Monday, informed staff that job cuts were made in a bid to take swift action in response to the company’s slowing growth.  

According to a report by Bloomberg, in an internal meeting, Sundar Pichai has said that he had consulted with the company’s founders and the board in making the decision for 6% cut. 

“If you don’t act clearly and decisively and early, we can compound the problem and make it much worse,” Pichai said. “These are decisions I needed to make.” 

On Friday, Google revealed that it will be laying off over 12,000 employees, making it the latest tech company to do so as inflation increases and global markets brace for a slump. Although rumors about the layoff had been circulating for months, it was nonetheless shocking to some workers when they were actually implemented.  

Since there was no centralised means for employees to find out who had lost their jobs, some employees took to writing to peers on messaging app Google Chat to see whether they were still employed.  

The report states that the layoffs were structural rather than performance driven. Since the final results of the employees’ performance reports won’t be out until later this month, some of them are worried that their jobs may be still at risk of elimination.  

Pichai warned top executives that their yearly bonuses will be significantly lowered this year because it is tied with the company's success and because leadership had to be accountable.   

Fiona Cicconi, Google's chief people officer, explained at a meeting with staff that the company's large scale necessitated keeping the number of individuals involved in making major decisions to a minimum.  

Ruth Porat, CFO of Alphabet, emphasised throughout the conference that the layoff was made so the firm could maintain its investment in strategic areas.  

“Act early, and you then create the capacity to invest for long-term growth,” Porat said. “As difficult as this was, those were the takeaways.”