$META announces it will freeze hiring and warns employees of restructuring

Meta tells employees it will freeze hiring and restructure some teams in cost cutting effort

BY [KURT WAGNER]

September 29, 2022 at 2:59 PM EDT

“I had hoped the economy would have more clearly stabilized by now, but from what we’re seeing it doesn’t yet seem like it has, so we want to plan somewhat conservatively,” Zuckerberg said. A Meta spokesperson declined to comment.

Meta’s further cost cuts and hiring freeze are its starkest admission that advertising revenue growth is slowing, amid mounting competition for users’ attention. Meta said earlier this year that it was planning to slow hiring for some management roles, and had postponed handing out full-time jobs to summer interns. The freeze was necessary because “we want to make sure we’re not adding people to teams where we don’t expect to have roles next year,” Zuckerberg explained.

Zuckerberg had warned in July that that Meta would “steadily reduce headcount growth,” and that “many teams are going to shrink so we can shift energy to other areas.” Priorities internally include Reels, Meta’s TikTok competitor, and Zuckerberg’s futuristic plan for the internet, known as the metaverse. Meta had more than 83,500 employees as of June 30, and added 5,700 new hires in the second quarter. Zuckerberg said the company would be “somewhat smaller” by the end of 2023.