Google Slashes Hiring Plans By 50% As Future Is Unpredictable – Adds 12,765 New Employees In 90 Days

Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet, the parent company of Google has revealed that the company plans to reduce their hiring in the fourth quarter of 2022 and in 2023 as well. 

As per reports, this step has been taken as there is a slowdown in the online advertising market.

Alphabet To Reduce Hiring As Online Advertising Slows Down

As per Alphabet, there has been an addition of 12,765 people in the third quarter making the total headcount 186,779 across the globe. This also includes 2,600 people as a part of its Mandiant acquisition. 

As per Pichai, “We’re sharpening our focus on a clear set of product and business priorities. Our Q4 headcount additions will be significantly lower than Q3. And as we plan for 2023, we’ll continue to make important trade-offs where needed and are focused on moderating operating expense growth.”

He was speaking during Alphabet’s earnings conference call 

During the call, Alphabet CFO Ruth Porat stated that headcount growth (in Q4) will reduce to less than half of what it was in Q3. However, they will keep hiring for important positions, with a focus on the best engineering and technical talent.

Alphabet To Increase Efficiency By Reallocating Resources

Pichai stated that in the most recent quarter, they started a push to increase efficiency by reallocating resources to focus on their greatest growth opportunities and abandoning a number of lower priority projects. Along with dissolving the team responsible for creating the device, this also means canceling its upcoming Pixelbook laptop and shutting down its game streaming service Stadia.

He said they would keep making long-term, responsible investments while being sensitive to the current economic climate.

Alphabet’s net income was $13.9 billion for the quarter, down 26.5 percent from $18.9 billion in the same quarter last year.

Revenues increased by 6% to $69.1 billion for the quarter, a significant slowdown from a growth of 41% a year earlier as advertisers cut back on spending in certain sectors like financial services like insurance, loans, mortgages, and cryptocurrencies.