Facebook Is Firing Employees Selected By An Algorithm: Is This The Future Of HR?

Facebook earlier laid off around 60 contract workers.

Relying on algorithm to kick people out

However it has emerged that they were selected to be fired randomly by an algorithm.

This shows that companies are placing more trust in data-driven decisions than ever before.

The mass layoffs also indicate a tough economic environment.

Meta is one such example of Big Tech reining in spending and hiring.

Apple

Apple is another tech giant that revealed that it let go of about 100 recruiters.

The affected people were responsible for hiring and vetting new employees.

The company had warned its employees that it would slow down spending and hiring in certain divisions from next year.

Tesla

Elon Musk, Tesla CEO, announced in May that the company will lay off 10% of salaried employees in light of unfavorable conditions and having a ‘super bad feeling’ about the economy.

Netflix

Netflix, which lost 1.2 million subscribers during the first half of the year, reduced its headcount by 450 between May and June.

Alphabet

Google’s parent company Alphabet decided to slow down the pace of hiring in the remainder of the year.

Amazon

Amazon is said to be reducing the number of hourly workers through attrition.

It has also put on hold the construction of six new buildings in Bellevue, Nashville, and Nashville.

Weeding out non performers

CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently said that he will seek out underperforming employees and conduct aggressive performance reviews in preparation of a severe economic downturn.

“Realistically speaking, there are probably many people at the company that shouldn’t be,” Zuckerberg said.

What happened to the fired contractors?

The contract workers fired by his company were on the payroll of Accenture.

Meta has a deal for nearly half a million dollars per year with Accenture to provide workers in content moderation as well as business integrity.

Accenture announced the layoffs via video conference call last Tuesday.

Unfortunately for those fired, their employer failed to provide either new jobs or transfer opportunities.

Algorithm involvement confirmed

Contractors were informed that they could ‘reapply for any job‘ within the next two weeks, but their current work would be finished by September 2, and will be paid until October 3.

When a worker asked about how the laid-off workers were selected, Accenture representatives cited an algorithm that selected people randomly, without going into further details.

Similar example

This is not the first time that employees have been fired by an algorithm.

150 employees at Xsolla, a company offering payment processing services for the gaming industry, were laid off in August 2021

They were labeled by the algorithm as ‘unengaged’ and ‘unproductive’.