The impact of Google and other tech layoffs on other industries

Layoffs at tech companies have become a reality in the last year, especially in the last few months. As tech companies large and small factor in slowing growth after posting record profits during the pandemic. What’s less certain is where these tens of thousands of tech workers will go next.

The good news is that there are still many job openings for these workers, both within the tech industry as well as outside it. There is also growing interest in starting new businesses. Layoffs will certainly contribute to some people’s decision to leave the tech industry or go on their own, but looking at the problems of the industry itself, from burnout to bad layoff practices, is not. Worth it. To choose a life after technology.

“People were drawn to Big Tech because they were obsessed with the perks. It was very sexy. One Kate Duchene said. “The downside is you get fired by email at 3am. Or the reason you found out you were fired is because your badge stopped working.”

This is all part of the cultural shift taking place at big tech companies. Big tech companies have long devoured highly skilled workers for high salaries and fancy perks. Now these companies are preaching austerity and asking their huge workforces to behave like startups again. At the same time, the tech giant has gone from an exciting place to work to a place not all that different from other companies in America, leading some to question what they’ve seen in the industry in the first place.

They’ve made a lot of headlines, but recent layoffs look more like a course correction than a bubble burst. Last year he lost 160,000, according to Layoffs.fyi, so far this year he has lost 78,000 tech industry workers. But while the layoffs are so devastating for those involved, the numbers are still not enough to deal a real blow to the huge tech job market.

Overall, the U.S. tech industry, which includes companies such as Google and Apple, added its workforce for the 25th straight month in December, according to data from industry group CompTIA. The number of people working in technical jobs (defined by the association as computer-related technical jobs such as software developers, network engineers, and data analysts) hit a record high of about 6.5 million that month, and their unemployment rate plummeted. was close to the record. as low as 1.8% compared to 3.5% for all jobs. It’s certainly possible that those numbers have changed in his January, but tens of thousands of layoffs don’t affect an industry of millions.

According to CompTIA, most people who work in technology (59%) don’t actually work in the tech industry. This number has remained remarkably stable over the past decade. That’s because the tech industry has also grown, especially software development, even though financial, healthcare, and retail companies have started to need more tech talent to help them digitize and automate their businesses. But in the coming months and years, it could lean more toward companies outside the tech industry.

“Looking at some of these changes happening now as we head into 2023, I wouldn’t be surprised to see bigger changes. [of tech workers] Tim Herbert, Chief Research Officer at CompTIA, told Recode. He added that he does not expect a large exodus of workers from the tech industry, but that even a 1 percentage point change would be noticeable given the size of tech jobs.

It’s important to remember that the tech industry employs all kinds of workers. We don’t know the breakdown of what types of jobs tech companies are losing, but it’s safe to say that many of them are in jobs like HR and sales that don’t require a computer science degree. . Google’s layoffs in California, for example, certainly hit people in engineering jobs, but his in-house massage therapist included nearly 30 of them. For employees who have been laid off in recent weeks, the decision to find a new tech job, leave the tech industry, or start their own business could depend on what they did with tech. I have.

Workers with in-demand technology skill sets – engineers – will be the easiest to find more jobs wherever they go. According to a December 2022 report by tech hiring platform Dice, there were about 300,000 job vacancies for tech professionals in December, which is below the peak but broadly in line with the past four years. The largest and fastest growing industries for tech professionals are finance, manufacturing, and healthcare. Meanwhile, the list of the biggest employers for tech talent includes tech giants like Google and Amazon, along with giants like Wells Fargo, General Motors and Anthem Blue Cross.

“Given the extent of downsizing in the tech industry and the widely publicized reasons why the decisions were made, many tech professionals are twice as likely to think about taking on their next role at a tech giant or start-up. You’re likely to see them thinking,’ Nick Kolakowski’s senior editor Dice told Recode.

Michael Skaff made the decision to leave the tech industry well before his current layoff. He spent the first half of his 30-year career in various his IT jobs within the tech field, and the second half elsewhere. He currently serves as his CIO, Chief Technology Officer, for the Jewish Senior Living Group, a healthcare management company. He acknowledges that the rate of technological change is much slower outside of technology, but despite the need for technological change, the ethos of technology to “move fast and break things” is the ethos of healthcare. I don’t think it’s suitable for such an industry.

“There are ways to change within existing operational flows that allow progress without breaking or breaking anything,” said Skaff. “You don’t want to break healthcare.”

For non-tech companies that can’t offer as high a salary or don’t have the cultural appeal of the world’s Googles, now is their chance to hire the tech workers they’ve been wanting for so long. Enticing enough in itself. However, these new hires still don’t come cheap. According to his recent Gartner research shared with Recode, compensation is still the most important thing that drives tech workers to work, but his second item on that list is a new addition. harmony.

Graham Waller, vice president of research at Gartner, said: “Traditional employers, such as banks, retailers, and healthcare companies, have taken advantage of some of their retired employees, and perhaps even offered them the opportunity to win back. is certain,” he said.

These layoffs also give workers an opportunity to become independent. Last year saw the second-highest number of applications for startups on record, with tech workers fueling the trend.

For Joe Cardillo, starting his own business was a way to improve himself and others’ work. Cardillo, who used to manage a marketing team at a tech startup, has navigated a ‘grind culture’ to his own management coaching firm after going through a series of ‘very stressful’ layoffs since the start of the pandemic. Launched his The Early Manager. Cardillo took what he felt worked well in his previous job and managed and taught others to do so. They combine that with ideas about how to build good workplaces, including giving employees more say in working conditions. .

“I’m very interested in the idea that democracy works,” Cardillo said.

It certainly feels a far cry from what seems to be the brutality of recent tech layoffs that have left many feeling bitter. Whether people can actually get better conditions or more friendly treatment elsewhere remains to be seen.