Google Laying Off 100 Employees at YouTube as Job Cuts Continue

Google Laying Off 100 Employees at YouTube as Job Cuts Continue
The Google and YouTube logos are seen at the entrance to the Google offices in Los Angeles, Calif., on Nov. 21, 2019. (Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images)
Katabella Roberts
1/17/2024
Updated:
1/17/2024
0:00

Google has announced another round of layoffs—this time impacting employees working at YouTube— just weeks after it reportedly slashed thousands of jobs across several departments as part of “responsible investing” efforts.

The tech giant confirmed it will eliminate 100 roles at the video platform as part of the latest cuts. That represents around 1.4 percent of YouTube’s nearly 7,200 workers.

“As we’ve said, we’re responsibly investing in our company’s biggest priorities and the significant opportunities ahead,” a Google spokesperson confirmed to TechCrunch. “To best position us for these opportunities, throughout the second half of 2023, a number of our teams made changes to become more efficient and work better and to align their resources to their biggest product priorities.”

“Some teams are continuing to make these kinds of organizational changes, which include some role eliminations globally,” the spokesperson added.

The Epoch Times has contacted a Google spokesperson for further comment.

The latest job cuts were announced to staff in an internal memo sent by YouTube’s chief business officer, Mary Ellen Coe, on Wednesday afternoon, The New York Times reported.

According to her LinkedIn profile, Ms. Coe has thousands of overseas employees, including those working in sales and business operations.

However, according to the publication, the latest layoffs impact employees at YouTube’s operations and creator management teams, which are responsible for supporting content producers on the platform.

Union Says Google Layoffs Impacted ‘Thousands’

Workers impacted by the cuts will have 60 days to find new roles within the company before their dismissals officially take effect, The New York Times reported.

“We’re continuing to support any impacted employees as they look for new roles here at Google and beyond,” the Google spokesperson told TechCrunch.

The latest job cuts come after Google last week said it was slashing jobs across various departments, including engineering, services, Google’s Voice Assistant program, and some augmented-reality projects, as part of cost-cutting efforts.

At the time, the tech giant said the cuts would impact hundreds of workers across its digital assistant, hardware, and internal software tools teams responsible for Pixel, Nest, and Fitbit.

However, the Alphabet Workers Union, representing some of its employees, stated that the cuts impacted thousands, not hundreds, of workers at Google.
“The real reason for the layoffs is simple: corporate greed. In the last year, the company earned tens of billions in profits, held over $100 billion in cash reserves, and raised its stock by 40 percent,” the union wrote in a statement on X, formerly Twiter.
“Executive pay has gone untouched, all while thousands of our coworkers have had their lives turned upside down, and those who remain on the job work in constant anxiety that they will be next,” the union added.

More Job Cuts Announced

Elsewhere this week, Google announced on Tuesday that it is removing “several hundred” employees globally in its advertising sales team, Business Insider reported.

According to Business Insider, Google Chief Business Officer Philipp Schindler told workers in an internal memo that the layoffs were due to changes in how Google’s sales team operated.

Company spokesperson Chris Pappas confirmed in a statement to The Verge that “a few hundred roles globally are being eliminated” as part of those cuts to Google’s advertising sales team job cuts.

“Every year, we go through a rigorous process to structure our team to provide the best service to our Ads customers,” Mr. Pappas said. “We map customers to the right specialist teams and sales channels to meet their service needs.”

“As part of this, a few hundred roles globally are being eliminated, and impacted employees will be able to apply for open roles or elsewhere at Google,” the spokesperson added.

The latest layoffs mark some of the largest since Google said it was laying off roughly 12,000 employees globally—amounting to about 6 percent of Alphabet’s workforce— in January 2023, citing economic turbulence.