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Amazon campus in Palo Alto, California.
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Tech companies including Google, Amazon and Discord have already announced plans to lay off hundreds of employees this year. Meanwhile, edtech company Duolingo announced it laid off about 10% of its contract workers. According to layoff tracker Layoffs.fyi, about 48 tech companies have laid off roughly 7,500 workers in the first two weeks of 2024.
There’s no perfect science to anticipate a layoff, but there are ways to prepare. Contributor Chris Westfall looks at the job market and shares his advice in this story. A big question: How many of these layoffs can be attributed to artificial intelligence? As always, read on for more career advice and workplace news.
WORK SMARTER
Practical insights and advice from staff and contributors to help you succeed in your job, accelerate your career and lead smarter
So you made some New Year’s resolutions. Now, let’s turn them into daily habits.
Does your home office need an update?
For more efficient meetings, try these tips.
If you’re messaging recruiters on LinkedIn, try these steps to help you get noticed.
Is it time to make a career change?
CAREER ADVICE Q&A
Jessica McCabe
Writer and YouTuber
Jessica McCabe
Jessica McCabe is a former actress turned writer and YouTuber, known for her channel “How to ADHD” where she educates others on ADHD and shares advice such as how to best work from home for those who are neurodiverse. McCabe, who was diagnosed with ADHD at age 12, also authored the Book “Amazon.com/How-ADHD-Insiders-Working-Against/dp/0593578945″>How to ADHD: An Insider’s Guide to Working with Your Brain (Not Against It).”
What strategies would you give to people who are neurodiverse in the workplace?
There’s so many different types of neurodiversity. But the general thing that I think is really important for anybody with any sort of neurodiversity is to recognize and understand the ways your brain works differently than how the world is designed.
For example, I know that I have relative impairments in working memory. If I am trying to fill out a form, that’s going to be a little bit more difficult for me because these forms are designed for people with typical working memory, and mine’s impaired.
Then, if you can, have conversations with your boss and co-workers about the specific challenges you face and what you need to be able to work more effectively. Sometimes that means you need accommodations.
There’s a fantastic website I highly recommend called askjan.org where you can look up your conditions, by the condition, by disability, or by area of work—like what it’s impairing—but it’ll give you suggestions as to what types of challenges you might face and what accommodations are available. A lot more employers are becoming aware of how helpful that could be. And if you need help, there’s also a live chat and a phone number that you can call so that they can support you through that process.
Conversations with your boss can be nerve-wracking. What’s your advice for approaching a discussion like that?
There’s different ways you could do it. If you feel safe enough to disclose your diagnosis, then share your diagnosis and explain what it means for you—because people are going to have preconceived notions as to what it means.
If you don’t feel comfortable, if you don’t feel safe talking about the diagnosis, you can speak about the specific challenges or use language like, “Hey, I work best if I can wear headphones so that I can kind of tune out all the extra noise around me so that I can focus. I work best if I have at least one day a week where I don’t have meetings so that I can get in the flow.” None of those things require disclosing a diagnosis.
But if you are comfortable talking about it and it’s safe for you to, if you know that your position’s secure, if you’re in a position of leadership, I think it’s really helpful to speak openly about it because it helps to combat the stigma and it makes it safer for your colleagues and other people who it might not be safe for to talk about their own challenges.
TOUCH BASE
News from the world of work
The latest layoffs: Amazon announced plans last week to cut “several hundred” workers in its Prime Video and MGM Studios divisions. Its video game live streaming service, Twitch, laid off about 35% of its staff. Meanwhile, Google laid off “hundreds.”
Voice actors criticize SAG-AFTRA over agreement with AI company: Voice actors took to social media to criticize SAG-AFTRA, the union representing actors and other entertainment professionals, for an agreement it struck last week with Replica Studios, an artificial intelligence voice technology company, that would allow video game developers to use digital replicas of actors’ voices.
Have student loans?: Senior contributor Adam Minsky highlights new programs and workplace benefits that could help.
UAW starts unionizing largest U.S. Mercedes plant: Over 1,500 workers at a Tuscaloosa, Alabama Mercedes-Benz plant—one of the largest non-unionized auto plants in the country and the German auto manufacturer’s primary facility in the U.S.—have signed union cards. That meets the minimum threshold of support the National Labor Relations Board requires to hold a union election.
CHECKLIST
Add these books and videos to your to-do list
- In this video, Mozilla CEO Mitchell Baker shares the lessons she’s learned as intellectual property lawyer for Netscape and building the Mozilla community.
- In All In: How Great Leaders Build Unstoppable Teams, author Mike Michalowicz details his formula for creating teams in any work environment for leaders at all levels.
NUMBER TO NOTE
80%
That’s the percentage of engineers dedicated to trust and safety that were fired by Elon Musk after he bought Twitter, according to a recent report by eSafety, Australia’s online safety commissioner.
Half of internal moderators and a third of X’s trust and safety team around the globe were fired after Musk’s arrival, Australia’s online safety regulator says. The revelations, as ’ Thomas Brewster reports, come as the commissioner used Australia’s Online Safety Act to demand X answer questions on how it is keeping users safe.
QUIZ
After dropping out of the 2024 presidential race following the Iowa caucuses, businessman Vivek Ramaswamy threw his support behind which candidate?
A. Ron DeSantis
B. Nikki Haley
C. Donald Trump
D. Joe Biden
Check if you got it right here.
