Human Resource Community

An internal memo from Amazon claims that the tech giant has made voluntary layoffs available to some employees. CNBC has looked at the confidential document. Employees in numerous departments, including human resources and employee services, have received the voluntary severance offer. For individuals who accept this offer, three months of compensation will be given in addition to one week’s pay for every six months of employment. Employees who choose this voluntary severance will also receive a 12-week payment that can be used to lower COBRA premiums, as well as the continuation of their insurance through the end of December. Employees have until November 29 to accept this offer, and they have till December 5 to decline it if they change their minds. Amazon will pick who stays and who departs after this. For those whose resignations would be accepted, will be informed next month, and their last working day will be December 23. The severance payment marks the start of the 10,000 staff layoffs that the company announced last week. It appears that the company is giving individuals some time before sacking them because a large number of people have reportedly been urged to find another job within the next two months. It appears that the company has also let go of staff members from departments including Alexa, retail, and human resources.

Basavaraj Bommai, the chief minister of Karnataka, has urged every employee of the state’s government to put in an hour more each day. On November 10, 2022, Bommai was addressing at a gathering where a delegation from the Karnataka State Government Employees Association was supporting him in his efforts to form the 7th Pay Commission and impose a revised pay scale for state government employees. Bommai urged the workforce to put in an additional hour of work in order for the State to advance quickly and contribute to the greater goal of making India a $5 trillion economy. He placed a specific emphasis on aiding the state’s underprivileged, oppressed, and female citizens. Bommai stated that Karnataka should contribute around $1 trillion toward the goal of making India a $5 trillion economy. He mentioned that the State had a Rs. 5000 crore revenue deficit when he took office. He did admit that state government officials put in a lot of effort and achieved all of their goals, if not more. He expressed his gratitude in particular to the police and the healthcare sector for their round-the-clock assistance during the global pandemic. With inflation on the rise, Bommai said on the updated pay scale that it is crucial to earn the proper amount of money at the right time. The State government made the decision to implement the updated pay scale for all employees for this reason. The CM went on to say that he wanted every employee to work diligently and honestly, leaving the rest up to him.

The 11,000 employees that Facebook’s parent company Meta has decided to let go of will receive 16 weeks of base salary plus two extra weeks for each year of service, with no cap. This means that about 13% of its workforce is currently jobless. Reductions will be made on Facebook and Instagram. Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, wrote in a note to the staff, “I want to take accountability for these decisions and for how we got here.”  He also said that the company is taking a number of further actions to make a leaner and more efficient company by lowering discretionary expenditure and extending the hiring freeze through Q1. I know this is challenging for everyone, and I’m especially sorry to those impacted. Those affected will also get compensation for any remaining paid time off (PTO), in addition to the severance pay. The expense of healthcare for employees and their families will also be covered by the company for a period of six months. Additionally, Meta will offer three months of career help through a third-party vendor, including first access to unreleased employment leads. According to what you and your family need, “We have dedicated immigration specialists to help guide you,” Zuckerberg stated. According to the Company, the Restricted Stock Unit (RSU) will vest on November 15th. A similar level of support will be provided to employees based abroad. The announcement of distinct procedures will take into account regional employment legislation. Given the level of access to sensitive information, the Company further declared that it will immediately revoke any access to the Meta systems. However, the email addresses will be accessible all day so that individuals can send and receive farewell emails. Zuckerberg mentioned that after the COVID-19 outbreak, things didn’t turn out as expected. “Not only has online commerce returned to prior trends, but the macroeconomic downturn, increased competition, and ads signal loss have caused our revenue to be much lower than I’d expected. I got this wrong, and I take responsibility for that,” he said. The Company wanted to improve its capital efficiency in this new environment. The metaverse’s long-term vision, an AI discovery engine, business platforms, and other high-priority growth sectors will receive more of Meta’s resources going forward. “We’ve cut costs across our business, including scaling back budgets, reducing perks, and shrinking our real-estate footprint. We’re restructuring teams to increase our efficiency. But these measures alone won’t bring our expenses in line with our revenue growth, so I’ve also made the hard decision to let people go,” Zuckerberg said. I want you to know that we’re making these decisions to ensure our future is strong, Zuckerberg said in a message to the staff who were saved from this layoff.

Following Elon Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of Twitter Inc, the firm cut almost half of its workforce on Friday. Now, Bloomberg News reported on Sunday, the company is reaching out to the dozens of workers who lost their jobs and pleading with them to come back. Some of the people who have been asked to return were unintentionally fired. According to the report, which cited persons with direct knowledge of the actions, some people were fired before management learned that their work and experience could be required to create the new features Elon Musk envisioned. According to Twitter’s head of safety and integrity Yoel Roth, the company recently laid off 50% of its workforce, including members of the trust and safety team. Read: Musk defends Twitter’s layoffs, saying the company is losing $4 million daily and there was “no choice” The social media company’s employees said in tweets that some product and engineering teams, as well as teams in charge of communications, content curation, human rights, and machine learning ethics, had been removed. In Elon Musk’s first significant update to the social media site, Twitter updated its app on Saturday and started charging $8 for coveted blue check verification marks. Source: Bloomberg

Elon Musk, the new owner of Twitter, has asserted that a major round of layoffs at the microblogging platform were required due to the millions of dollars the company was losing daily. He clarified that all those losing their jobs were given three months of severance pay, “which is 50% more than legally required,” in an effort to soften the blow. “Regarding Twitter’s reduction in force, unfortunately there is no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day. Everyone exited was offered 3 months of severance, which is 50% more than legally required,” Musk tweeted. A week after the $44 billion takeover by the billionaire business magnate, Twitter announced employment layoffs. With Musk in charge, a lot has happened, from letting go of executives to suggesting a new content moderation council. In the days following his takeover, rumours surfaced that he intended to fire at least half the Twitter employees in an effort to reduce expenses and save money. Musk first denied the accusations, but on Friday he reversed course and started firing staff members. Hours prior to the start of the first round of mass layoffs, Twitter declared in an internal memo to staff, “In an effort to place Twitter on a healthy path, we will go through the difficult process of reducing our global workforce on Friday.” The cuts appear to be as severe as they were broad, hitting both Twitter’s marketing division and its trust and safety teams, which are responsible for content moderation. There are rumours that the company’s entire human rights team was fired. Following the layoffs, Twitter employees filed a class action lawsuit against the tech giant, claiming that the firm violated federal and California law by performing mass layoffs without giving the requisite 60-day notice.

Microsoft’s CyberShikshaa programme will train 45,000 women in order to close the skills gap in the field of cyber security. Over the following three years, the initiative will give 45,000 women and underserved youth technological skills that will enable them to find employment in the cyber security field. Additionally, it will help to ensure diversity in the nation’s cybersecurity workforce. The Data Security Council of India (DSCI), Tata STRIVE, and the ICT Academy are partners in the CyberShikshaa programme. About 10,000 students will also have the opportunity to participate in internships or jobs under the initiative. According to data, there will be around 3.5 million cybersecurity positions available worldwide over the next three years. This is due to the fact that businesses, entrepreneurs, and governments all over the world feel the need to protect their data. In around six years, there will likely be a 32% increase in the number of cybersecurity positions in India. However, due to a 42 percent shortage in the talent pool, there won’t be enough qualified candidates for these positions. In the previous four years, the Cybershikshaa programme has been effective in training 1,100 women and assisting more than 800 of them in finding employment. The program’s current skill gap will be closed through future programme growth and an emphasis on specialised training for certain sectors.

Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot has paved the way for the regularisation of contractual workers employed in various ministries throughout the state government by giving his approval to the execution of the “Rajasthan Contractual Hiring to Civil Post Rules, 2022.” Over 1.10 lakh contract workers will benefit from the action and receive social security as a result. When it comes to the hiring of contract workers, there will be more transparency if this Rule is put into effect. Reservation-related issues will also be considered during the hiring process. The central and state governments’ welfare and social security programmes have benefited greatly from the efforts of contract workers, but little has been done to safeguard their social security. While many committees were established to regularise the state government’s contract workers, their concerns were not finally settled. The CM had announced the establishment of a department-specific cadre of contractual employees in the state budget for 2021–2022, as well as a 20% raise in their pay in the budget for 2022–2023. According to a government announcement, the adoption of the Rule will help the approximately 41,423 contractual staff working in the education department, including shiksha karmis, para-teachers, gram panchayat assistants, and MG English medium teachers. A total of 1,18,326 Rajivika and MNREGA employees working for the rural development and panchayati raj departments will also benefit from it, as will 5,697 madrassa para-teachers employed by the minority welfare department and 44,833 contract workers employed by the medical and health departments as well as the medical education department.

In the years to come, Gujarat will employ a large number of people. Over the next five years, Tech Mahindra plans to employ at least 3,000 employees in the State. In accordance with its IT/IT-enabled services (ITeS) policy, the Indian company providing information technology services has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Gujarat government to this effect. With the help of this MoU, Tech Mahindra will be able to improve business operations and adapt to changing customer demands. The Gujarat government has signed approximately 15 agreements thus far under the IT/ITeS programme with a variety of Indian companies as well as numerous international organisations. If everything goes according to plan, there will be employment prospects in the State for around 26,750 people. Thousands of crores are likely to be invested by Lulu Group International in Gujarat to build Ahmedabad’s largest shopping mall, if media reports are to be believed. The mall being built by the UAE-based Lulu Group is anticipated to get started in the next year. The Group invested over Rs 2,000 crore in the construction of its mall in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, in July 2022 and anticipates that it would directly and indirectly employ more than 15,000 people. Gujarat is also anticipated to see the creation of similar prospects. Not only that, a semiconductor manufacturing facility will be built in Gujarat as a result of a joint venture between Vedanta, an Indian metal-mining company, and Foxconn, Taiwanese electronics manufacturing company. By the time manufacturing begins at the factory in 2025, additional jobs will be available.

For employees of four public sector general insurance companies effective from August 2017, the Finance Ministry has announced an average 12% pay increase. A gazette notification dated October 14, 2022 stated, “This Scheme may be called the General Insurance (Rationalisation of Pay Scales and other Conditions of Service of Officers) Amendment Scheme, 2022,” It added that officials and workers will receive arrears for five years and that this wage revision would take effect on August 1, 2017, and that it would apply to people who had worked for these companies. It further stated that the subsequent revision, which is scheduled in August 2022, will take the form of variable pay based on both the employer’s and the employee’s performance. The imposition of remuneration linked to employee performance and corporate performance is not well received by the unions. “We are having strong reservations against the way the wage revision has been done after the wait of 64 months. Linking wages with performance seems to be illogical as we employees undertake so many government schemes,” General Insurance Employees’ All India Association (GIEAIA) general secretary Trilok Singh said. He added that state-owned insurance company employees, not those from the private sector, are what make all government programmes successful, thus there is no equal playing field for public sector insurance companies. Data from year to year show that the private sector has lagged, he continued. Singh emphasised that although unions are not opposed to reforms, they should be implemented with consideration for the public sector structure of these companies. The General Insurance Business (Nationalisation) Amendment Act, which was announced by the government last year, will enable it to reduce its ownership of state-owned general insurers to below 51%. An official source estimated that the combined wage bill for New India Assurance, National Insurance, Oriental Insurance, and United India Insurance will be close to Rs 8,000 crore due to the 12% raise plus five years of arrears. Every five years, wages are revised for public sector banks and insurance firms. The following pay raise for insurance company employees is scheduled to begin in August 2022. Source: PTI

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) views moonlighting as unethical. The activity is against the company’s core beliefs and culture. So far, no staff member has been expelled for it. However, it has been made clear to staff members that the company will not accept moonlighting. According to Rajesh Gopinath, CEO of TCS, the Company’s stance on moonlighting is expressly specified in the employment contract. Moonlighting is reportedly considered a “ethical issue” that goes against TCS’s core values and culture by Milind Lakkad, the company’s chief human resources officer, according to a report by Mint. Earlier, organisations like Wipro, Infosys, and IBM have stated their displeasure of the practise. Wipro fired 300 employees who were found to be moonlighting and “violating integrity” in September, making it clear that it would not allow such conduct within the company. Working a second job while still employed by one company is known as moonlighting. Swiggy made news for its permissive approach on staff moonlighting as long as the relevant supervisors were aware of it and had given their approval. While there isn’t a legislation in India specifically prohibiting “moonlighting,” there are regulations that control or place limitations on dual employment to a certain extent. IT companies worry about moonlighting because they think it could reduce staff productivity and jeopardise the confidentiality of customer data.