‘There will be blood on streets,’ Google executives warn employees about layoffs

IANS

San Francisco, August 13

As Big Tech companies begin to lay off employees in the global economic downturn, Google executives have reportedly warned workers to either boost performance or prepare to leave as “there will be blood on the streets” if the next quarterly earnings are not good.

In a company message viewed by Insider, Google Cloud sales leadership has threatened employees with an “overall examination of sales productivity and productivity in general” and that if next quarter results “don’t look up, there will be blood on the streets.” If third quarter results “don’t look up, [then] there will be blood on the streets,” according to a message conveyed to the sales team. The warning was first reported by Insider.

Google employees are “fearful of layoffs” after the company quietly extended its hiring freeze this month without making an announcement, reports The New York Post.

The company has now reportedly warned employees with layoffs if they don’t produce results.

Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai told employees late last month that they must improve productivity due to fierce economic headwinds.

Pichai said that he wanted to solicit ideas from his employees on how to get “better results faster.”

“There are real concerns that our productivity as a whole is not where it needs to be for the head count we have,” he was quoted as saying.

Google in July put a freeze on hiring for two weeks to review its headcount needs and decide on future course of action. The company earlier announced to slow down hirings for the rest of the year.

According to Pichai, “It’s clear we are facing a challenging macro environment with more uncertainty ahead.”

Alphabet, the parent company of Google, reported weaker-than-expected earnings and revenue for the April-June period (Q2).

Revenue growth slowed to 13 per cent from 62 per cent in the same quarter last year.

Other tech companies that have either laid off employees or slowed hiring in the current economic downturn include LinkedIn, Meta, Oracle, Twitter, Nvidia, Snap, Uber, Spotify, Intel and Salesforce, among others.