LinkedIn mass layoffs: The jobs platform cuts another 668 employees in its third layoff this year

LinkedIn is trimming its workforce once again.

The company, on Monday, announced plans to cut 668 jobs across its engineering, product, talent, and finance teams. This is the second mass layoff at the company this year, following a decision in May to cut 716 jobs, and the third this year. An undisclosed number of workers on its talent acquisition team were let go in February, as reported then by The Information.

“Talent changes are a difficult, but necessary and regular part of managing our business,” the company said in a statement. “While we are adapting our organizational structures and streamlining our decision making, we are continuing to invest in strategic priorities for our future and to ensure we continue to deliver value for our members and customers. We are committed to providing our full support to all impacted employees during this transition and ensuring that they are treated with care and respect.”

The belt-tightening comes despite a 5% year-over-year increase in revenues in the most-recent quarter. LinkedIn revenue topped $15 billion for the first time this fiscal year and has seen membership growth for eight consecutive quarters, Microsoft announced in July.

An internal email announcing the layoffs, published on Insider, said the decision to reduce staff was made with the long-term needs of the business in mind.

“As we continue to execute on our FY24 plan, we need to also evolve how we work and what we prioritize so we can deliver on the key initiatives we’ve identified that will have an outsized impact in achieving our business goals,” it read.

The most recent cuts work out to approximately 3.5% of LinkedIn’s current workforce, which previously stood at 19,500, according to the company.

LinkedIn’s staff reductions follow massive layoffs that owner Microsoft made across its other divisions of the company in January. The company has previously cited a need to become more agile in its business operations as demand for its product fluctuates. Part of that has included reducing management roles and slowing its hiring as advertising spending, the chief source of LinkedIn’s revenue, has faced headwinds as economic concerns have grown.

LinkedIn isn’t the only tech company laying off workers. Late last week, Qualcomm announced plans to eliminate 1,258 positions; LendingClub cut 172 jobs and supply chain software startup Flexport laid off roughly 20% of its workforce, nearly 700 employees.

Year to date, over 1,000 tech companies have laid off some 242,481 workers, according to Layoffs.fyi.

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