Amazon appears to be gearing up for another possible round of job reductions, according to a recent memo from CEO Andy Jassy. In this internal message, Jassy outlined the company’s plans to introduce significant changes focused on optimizing its workforce. By the end of Q1 2025, the company wants to reduce the number of managers in various divisions by fifteen percent.
The memo made it clear that an organizational structure that is more effective and flexible will result from having fewer managers and a higher percentage of individual contributors.
“Having fewer managers will remove layers and flatten organisations more than they are today,” stated Jassy. He claims that this reform will decrease bureaucracy, enhance decision-making, empower workers at the local level, and eventually help the business provide better customer service.
Although Amazon has presented the adjustments as an attempt to increase employee ownership and efficiency, it is likely that this is a prelude to further layoffs. This follows a wave of significant layoffs in 2023 when cost-cutting measures resulted in the loss of jobs for 27,000 staff. The workers at Amazon are likely to be concerned about the announcement of these impending changes, especially considering the company’s history of layoffs.
Jassy further stated that in order to put these changes into effect in the upcoming months, the company’s People Experience and Technology (PxT) team will collaborate closely with Amazon’s leadership. He states that the objective is to transform the organization so that workers can work more quickly and make choices that directly affect clients.
The company’s emphasis on “flattening” its organisational structure and raising the proportion of individual contributors suggests that further layoffs are likely, even if the memo did not specifically announce any job cutbacks. Amazon has also disclosed a significant modification to their labor policy in the same memo.
Effective January 2, 2025, the company will mandate its corporate staff to work from the office five days a week, shifting away from the hybrid model adopted during the pandemic. At present, Amazon employees are only required to be in the office three days a week.
