Google slows hiring for 2022, CEO Sundar Pichai blames global economic downturn in lengthy memo

Google is reportedly planning a slowdown in hiring for the rest of the year, a memo sent to employees has revealed. The tech giant has joined others in making adjustments to expenses as the global economic conditions worsen. While Google has mostly remained immune to drastic changes in the global economy, it has, for the first time, addressed the impact the company feels it is experiencing.

In a memo, obtained by Bloomberg, Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai highlighted that “we’re not immune to economic headwinds” just like all companies and set the stage for the announcement that the company will be “slowing the pace of hiring for the rest of the year, while still supporting our most important opportunities.” Pichai said Google will focus on the hiring of people in engineering, technical, and other critical roles for the rest of 2022 and 2023.

Pichai said the company added 10,000 employees, popularly called Googlers, in the second quarter, while, for the third quarter, it has a “strong number of commitments” such as recruiting college students. However, the roles are likely to go minimum.

“Moving forward, we need to be more entrepreneurial, working with greater urgency, sharper focus, and more hunger than we’ve shown on sunnier days. In some cases, that means consolidating where investments overlap and streamlining processes,” Pichai wrote.

Google during pandemic

The pandemic lashed nearly every industry, but the tech industry managed to escape the worse impact because of the change in how people — stuck in their homes — relied on their gadgets. YouTube, for instance, reported profits in the fourth quarter of 2020 with ad revenue of over $6.9 billion — a 46 percent increase over the previous quarter. Alphabet managed to endure the headwinds but there was still some impact, only aggravated by the Russian invasion of Ukraine earlier this year.

But Google is just one of the companies that are restructuring their company to absorb the impact. Uber recently said it will have to be “hardcore about costs” — hinting at the possible marginalisation of roles, while Meta wrote to its employees warning them of “serious times” ahead shortly after it froze hiring. Snap also announced plans to slow hiring, while Spotify, too, said it will take a break from recruiting more people.

While the aforementioned companies did not fire people, Netflix emerged as the company to fire hundreds of employees in an attempt to cut down on losses. Twitter also announced a layoff of several employees amid doubts over the takeover by Elon Musk, only to find itself battling the world’s richest man in court after he pulled out from the deal.

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