What isn’t working with Mark Zuckerberg’s meta? Employee morale, Metaverse and TikTok battle with propensity scales
CEO Mark Zuckerberg looked nervous as he battled staff questions for an hour town meeting out of Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ: META) Headquarters in California.
The workforce bombarded Zuckerberg with questions, including why they should have confidence in his leadership. “That’s a perfectly valid question,” Zuckerberg replied to the Washington Post quoted from a Meet recording.
Zuckerberg has reportedly lost his vision and the trust of his workforce in the face of record layoffs and costly investments in the virtual reality “metaverse,” with no immediate signs that the company is paying off.
Meta’s core product, Facebook, lags behind TikTok in user interaction. Meta also lags behind others when it comes to generative artificial intelligence microsoft corp (NASDAQ: MSFT).
Meta-insiders say the layoffs and pledges to further cut costs have quashed internal resolve. Even the highest echelons of meta leadership, including Chief Technology Officer Andrew Bosworth, blame Zuckerberg for the company’s plight.
Meta has grown its headcount by double-digit percentage points over the years, accelerating during the pandemic. Headcount nearly doubled between 2019 and 2022 as Meta benefited from an influx of brands using Facebook and Instagram to reach customers. But as the pandemic recovered, the performance of e-commerce reversed.
Meta’s Metaverse products also failed to catch on. The renaming cannot lead to certain products being offered at dumping prices. Reality Labs lost more than $13.7 billion last year — down from $10.2 billion in 2021 and $6.6 billion in 2020.
John Carmack, the former senior consultant for the company’s virtual reality division, resigned in December after failing to address the division’s inefficiencies.
In early 2022, Meta’s optimism began to wane when Meta’s flagship app, Facebook as a public company, lost daily users for the first time in its decade, causing its stock price to plummet. The losses followed Meta’s plans to downsize, which caused alarm among Facebook’s workforce.
“I got that wrong. It was a big mistake,” Zuckerberg said at the same meeting, citing his overestimated earnings. “Going forward, that means we need to be a leaner and more capital-efficient company.”
Meta is currently in the midst of its second round of layoffs, cutting 4,000 jobs in May. Since November, Meta has announced plans to lay off 21,000 employees, or nearly a quarter of its workforce.
At a town hall meeting this month, Zuckerberg provided a compelling rationale for why employees should stay at the company.
Price promotion: META shares traded 1.02% lower at $237.90 at last check on Monday.
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This article What isn’t working with Mark Zuckerberg’s meta? Employee morale, Metaverse and TikTok battle with propensity scales originally appeared on Benzinga.com
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