‘Classy’: Meta employees slam company for conducting layoffs by email

Fired Meta employees expressed shock and disappointment Wednesday after learning they were caught in Mark Zuckerberg’s bloodbath – with some grumbling about the fact they learned they had been laid off by email.

Earlier Wednesday, Zuckerberg revealed that Meta had fired more than 11,000 employees, or about 13% of its workforce, as it contends with a major downturn in its business.

“Just woke up to find out I had been laid off by Meta/Instagram from an email,” said Carlos Giffoni, who worked as a product manager for Instagram, according to his LinkedIn account.

“No warning, and was told recently by a lead the team I worked on was high priority and wouldn’t be affected. Company wide layoffs via email. Classy. I guess I have plenty of time for writing now,” Giffoni added.

Madison Strickland, a recruiter for Meta’s machine learning team, revealed she was laid off despite being eight months pregnant.

“Unfortunately, I am part of 11,000 employees at Meta that were laid off this morning. I never thought I’d find myself in this position especially 2 weeks before my maternity leave,” Strickland wrote.

The layoffs were the most extensive reduction of headcount in Meta’s history. Zuckerberg apologized to employees and admitted that he had underestimated how much revenue would plunge due to “the macroeconomic downturn, increased competition, and ads signal loss.”

Meta’s billionaire boss said workers across the company’s “family of apps” such as Instagram and WhatsApp were impacted, with recruiters “disproportionately affected” by the cuts.

Nathan Magner, a technical recruiter for design talent at Meta, also decried the company’s method for breaking the news.

“#Layoffs suck. Finding out you got laid off via e-mail sucks. I’m among the 11,000 people that were laid off from Meta early this morning,” Magner wrote on LinkedIn.

Eric Triebe, a software engineering manager at Meta, said he “feels like I’m in an episode of Severance” due to the abrupt virtual exit.

“No meeting with HR. No good byes to co-workers. Seemingly no contact was made or discussion from leadership with my manager of skip in terms of justification. Just a cold, impersonal email and then the plug is pulled before you wake up,” Triebe said.

Another ousted recruiter, Brianna Sgro, said she was “hurt” by the company’s decision but would miss the experience of working at Meta.

“I’m sad, hurt, uncertain, disappointed, and now jobless.,” Sgro wrote.

“Although all of these things come to an end today, I am so thankful to experience them,” she added.

The Post has reached out to Meta for comment.

The job cuts have raised anxieties about Meta’s remaining employees who fear what’s next at the struggling tech giant.

“I think everyone is nervous about it. You never know, right?” one employee who recently joined the company told The Post.

“The only thing we know is on the internet,” said another employee.

“We didn’t see any other colleagues today on our team. They are working from home. It’s natural that people are nervous,” added his colleague.

Meta’s layoffs followed similar cuts at Twitter, Lyft and various other tech firms. Meta’s stock has plunged more than 70% this year as its troubled, expensive shift toward metaverse technology rattles investors.

Twitter also faced criticism last week for the way it conducted layoffs.

Zuckerberg said the layoffs would be part of extensive cost-cutting measures, including the implementation of desk-sharing for some workers and cuts to discretionary spending.

“I view layoffs as a last resort, so we decided to rein in other sources of cost before letting teammates go. Overall, this will add up to a meaningful cultural shift in how we operate,” Zuckerberg added.