Irrespective of the high-flying language in the message, layoffs always mean only one thing: the management failed to envision their needs for staffing and skills, failed to have a roadmap that is sensible for at least a few years, and failed to redeploy the workforce. Basically they are saying - we have no clue about the work we do next year, no clue about the skills needed, no clue about how many people are required. But we do recruiting, so that we have people, just in case.
Irrespective of the high-flying language in the message, layoffs always mean only one thing: the management failed to envision their needs for staffing and skills, failed to have a roadmap that is sensible for at least a few years, and failed to redeploy the workforce. Basically they are saying - we have no clue about the work we do next year, no clue about the skills needed, no clue about how many people are required. But we do recruiting, so that we have people, just in case.
Easy on the misinformation.
Microsoft traditionally cuts 6% of workforce per year for performance reasons.
The fact that this 6% is involved with AI doesn't change the underlying fact that this is still classic Microsoft performance management.
Source: https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2026/07/06/the-latest-in-ou...