Microsoft is Laying People Off. WTF?!

I was in a meeting yesterday at work, and I looked down to check my Twitter timeline on my Blackberry, when I noticed a tweet from my friend (@biggeek) saying that he had just been tweeted himself from a friend who works at Microsoft. That friend on the inside said they had been escorting people out of the building all day.

I sent him a direct message back asking him how many total are getting laid off, and he said 5,500 employees are slated to be laid off! WTF?!?! Turns out, only 1400 were laid off yesterday, but still.

A quick check online said that this is the first layoff in Microsoft's history! Crazy stuff! This is from the New York Times:

"Microsoft, based in Redmond, Wash., plans to lay off 5,000 of its 94,000 employees over the next 18 months, including 1,400 people on Thursday [yesterday]. The company disclosed the cuts as it released second-quarter results, which reflected an 11 percent drop in net income, to $4.17 billion, from $4.71 billion in the period a year ago."

This comes not very long after a recent notice I read about Google laying off people, of course not as many, only 100 compared to 5000 or so. This is from Silicon Alley Insider:

"Google has announced layoffs. Not contractors. Not hourly workers. Googlers.

Not many, thankfully--only 100--and some may be able to find jobs elsewhere in the company. But they're all in HR, which tells you something about how quickly Google has scaled back its own growth expectations."

This economy is seriously affecting all markets. I work in the Real Estate Market, and we have been hurting for over a year now, and have gone through three sets of layoffs our selves. It's certainly a scary time for everyone.

My recommendation: Make sure your resumes are up to date!

Have any of you been affected by layoffs? Know of someone that has? Share your stories in the comments.

Posted in: economy, google, layoff, microsoft