By Shaminy Navin
Brand & Marketing Specialist, Content Lead. HT Consulting
Special mention to PIKOM for providing industry insights and perspectives.
Over the last 2 years, the pandemic had led many Big Tech companies to go on hiring sprees to support the demand for digitalisation of businesses. However, with the loom of a slowing down global economy caused by rising inflation, the war between Ukraine and Russia and US-China tension - American titans on Wall Street, large FSIs and Big Tech firms have grabbed headlines throughout 2022 and into the new year of 2023 for their massive layoffs of employees.
Google parent Alphabet is one of the latest to join the Big Tech layoff bandwagon in 2023, announcing 12,000 job cuts in the United States this past January. This is soon to be followed by more layoff notifications for Googlers working outside of the U.S, while Googlers in Asia will have to wait till February to know if Alphabet’s downsizing efforts will impact them. CEO Sundar Pichai said that amongst those who were laid off were staff from the engineering and product teams working on new and experimental projects.
Facebook parent Meta witnessed its large-scale reduction in manpower in November which affected 11,000 employees in order to cope with its rising costs when a noticeable decline in the advertisement revenue was observed. CEO Mark Zuckerberg has admitted that over-hiring during the pandemic is one of the contributing factors to workforce reduction as well.
Amazon rolled out its first round of layoffs in November by terminating 10,000 employees. Sharing a similar reason with Meta, Amazon went on a hiring spree during the pandemic as the global lockdown spurred consumers to shop online. Additionally, in February 2022, it had doubled its maximum base pay cap to aggressively compete for talent. Unfortunately for Amazonians, the company had overbuilt for its forecasted demand, leading it to announce the culling of another 8,000 employees at the turn of this New Year, in order to cope with the current economic outlook.
The list of familiar Big Tech companies announcing layoffs continues, with Microsoft letting go a small number of employees over the summer and in October, and an additional 10,000 recently in January. The first few weeks of 2023 witnessed Salesforce furloughing 8,000 employees, SAP 3,000 and IBM 3,900 on February 1st.
Ripple Effects On Malaysian Tech Companies And Talent, if any
Continuous news reports concerning Big Tech layoffs may have caused anxiety amongst Malaysian tech talent and job seekers vying for opportunities in this industry. As such, we recently reached out to PIKOM — The National Tech Association of Malaysia, to share its views on the impact of U.S Big Tech’s downsizing on our Malaysian shores.
PIKOM Research Committee’s Chairman Mr. Woon Tai Hai expressed that currently the probability for massive layoffs to take place in Malaysia is slim. In fact, there may be an upsurge of demand for talent by local SMEs since the hiring process was put on hold during the pandemic years.
Besides, if any ripple effects were to be felt on our local shores, it would be one that is positive for our local tech companies, Mr. Woon shared. This is because the global layoffs may provide a new source of talent for our local tech market.
Malaysian Tech Companies and Job Outlook Remains Optimistic
As the Malaysian digital economy continues its upward growth trajectory — contributing a 24.4% share to our national GDP in 2022, our local tech industry will continuously be highly competitive on all fronts. Thus opportunities are still available for talent that are seeking to elevate their careers in the technology industry.
Multi-skilled, High Productivity Talent are Indispensable Assets
Mr. Woon also reminds employed talent and job seekers alike, that strengthening multi-skills including soft skills is crucial as employers can be demanding and very selective when evaluating these criteria. For instance, soft skills such as analytical thinking and problem solving enables one to think methodologically — an invaluable, transferable trait that would provide one with versatility across any given job role.
HTC had previously shared an opinion piece on Why Soft Skills Can Make Your Hard Skills Shine. Developing a balanced stack of soft skills and hard skills allows talent to stand out, consequently creating an opportunity to secure a job in a highly competitive tech industry.
In the last quarter of 2022, Alphabet had hinted that its 2023 layoff plans will include letting go of underperforming employees, through a newly implemented performance management system. At that time, CEO Sundar Pichai had also openly said that given the company’s plans of having a leaner-than-before resource structure, this will be a driving force for its employees to be disciplined and only work on the important things — ensuring that their time is well spent on delivering products that would make an impact.
Tech Skills are In-Demand, Fully-Subsidised Reskilling Programmes available at HTC
As more and more businesses across all industries continue building and expanding their online presence, and invest in digital transformation, the need for tech talent will continue to grow. In order to maintain its relevance and competitive edge, every company today will eventually evolve to become a company that requires a variety of tech-skilled roles within their organisation in the near future.
According to Indeed’s Best Jobs for 2023, its top 10 most sought-after careers across all industries include 5 roles that require tech skills — namely, Full stack developer, Data engineer, Cloud engineer, Back-end developer and Machine learning developer.
Should you be contemplating reskilling yourself with in-demand tech skills that could open new career opportunities for you in the tech industry, consider applying for our Job Readiness Program (JRP) for career changers which is expected to commence in May 2023. This is a fully subsidised reskilling programme offered by HTC.
With the likelihood that Malaysia will not be negatively impacted by the massive layoffs seen amongst the U.S. Big Tech companies, attention should therefore be refocused on how we can develop the required and relevant skill sets that can support our career growth ambitions in a digitalised economy.
Express your interest to apply for the Job Readiness Programme here