IBM Layoffs 2023: Is the "Hired Quickly So Fired Quickly" Excuse Dwindling?

IBM layoffs 2023 is at present the latest trend to rock the information technology industry. The company announced that is was letting go 3900 employees as they failed to meet their annual cash target. This decision has been taken instead of the fact that the company reported a solid growth and a quarterly revenue of $16.7 billion, which was higher than the Wall Street estimate of $16.4 billion. 

What is the Reason Behind IBM layoffs 2023?

The company reported a cash flow of 9.3 billion as opposed to the targeted $10 billion, which was apparently due to a higher-than expected working capital needs. IBM further went on to add that the mass firing, that is mainly a result of the spinoff of Kyndryl business and part of AI unit Watson Health, will cost the company charge of $300 million in the January to March period. 

Hired too Quickly so Firing Employees: Is this True?

Apart from IBM, several other large IT companies such as Google, Salesforce and Microsoft have also laid off employees. One of the most common reasons cited by these companies were that they hired quickly over the past two years, and now they did not need as many employees. However, some employees who were laid off by Google were with the company for over 20 years. 

“Well… I’m also one of the 12,000 people laid off from Google today. I found out when I went to work at 4AM to finish up an important analysis, and my badge didn’t work. After 17.5 years at Google, it was kind of a tough way to discover that I’d become a Xoogler. I still believe that Google’s got a great mission. I still believe in The Joy Of Search, but my enthusiasm was a little tempered this morning. Google We’ll see what the days ahead bring,” said Dan Russell a research scientist after he was fired from Google.

Along similar lines, Garima Sahai, engineering director, Google said that the layoff process should be more respectful. “To Google leadership (and I've considered myself part of it): I can imagine and have empathy for this being a super hard thing to do and I wish the process would have been a bit more respectful for all our sakes. For relatively new leaders at Google, I'm sorry you didn't get a chance to experience more of Google's unique people centric leadership before this had to be done. Nonetheless, Google has been a very special place, and I wish you the very best as you take care of it through tough times,” she said.

IBM on the other hand has announced the intent to fire employees despite hiring very slowly over the past two years. Nevertheless, James Kavanaugh, chief financial officer, IBM said that the company was still committed to hiring for client-facing research and development.