eBay Lays Off ~1000 Employees, CEO Blames Macroeconomic Headwinds, Expenses Outpace Growth

[valueaddedresource]

Breaking news: eBay is laying off 1,000 employees, about 9% of workforce. CEO Jamie Iannone says headcount and expenses are outpacing growth.

Exact details about specific areas affected have not been disclosed, so not sure what the impact on sellers will be yet but...this does not bode well for the Q4 report in my opinion. 👀

https://www.ebayinc.com/stories/news/ensuring-ebays-long-term-success/

We are on a path to building a stronger eBay for the future — one that is growing, and resilient in the face of any challenge. Over the past three years, we made fundamental changes in our experiences across categories and accelerated the pace of innovation at eBay. In areas where we’re investing, we are seeing consistent increases in customer satisfaction and a meaningful improvement in our growth relative to the market.

Our strategy is the right one, but there is more we can do to ensure our success. We need to better organize our teams for speed — allowing us to be more nimble, bring like-work together, and help us make decisions more quickly. Today, I am sharing news about changes we are implementing to better position eBay for long-term, sustainable growth.

The most significant and toughest of these decisions is to reduce our current workforce by approximately 1,000 roles or an estimated 9% of full-time employees. Additionally, we plan to scale back the number of contracts we have within our alternate workforce over the coming months. These are not actions we take lightly — and we recognize the impact they will have on all eBayers. We have to say goodbye to people who have made so many important contributions to the eBay community and culture, and this isn’t easy.

The Need for Change

Despite facing external pressures, like the challenging macroeconomic environment, we know we can be better with the factors we control. While we are making progress against our strategy, our overall headcount and expenses have outpaced the growth of our business. To address this, we're implementing organizational changes that align and consolidate certain teams to improve the end-to-end experience, and better meet the needs of our customers around the world.

[fern*wood]

I had no idea they had that many employees.  Makes me wonder…

[wastingtime101]

That's a large number - 9%. 🙁

No breakdown provided on domestic vs global.

[12345jamesstamps]

They are losing money in the "authentication"...but they are not even full time employees or employees. LOL

"eBay has suffered bugs where buyers can't add items to the shopping cart, or get through the checkout and pay for their order". This hits sales...and may reduce eBay's overall traffic, because buyers start to lose confidence in the service." This doesn't happen with other companies. You can add items in a shopping cart in other companies that sell items. It makes no sense to me. Maybe that .30 per item charge for buying several items?

[toomuchstuffagain35]

"scale back contracts with alternate workforces" - does that translate to off shore outsourced CS and IT?

[tools*]

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@fern*wood wrote:

I had no idea they had that many employees.  Makes me wonder…

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eBay is tiny with only about 10,000 employees. 1,541,000 people work for Amazon.

[toomuchstuffagain35]

And Amazon is also laying off people.

[hartungcards]

Well, it's good to know that In areas where we’re investing, we are seeing consistent increases in customer satisfaction ."  That means lots of happy shoppers for sneakers, watches, handbags and brake calipers.  I'm guessing they'll be combining the auto parts and handbag departments to better organize our teams for speed and bring like-work together.

[toomuchstuffagain35]

I LOVE corporate speak, almost as good as AI.

"macroeconomic headwinds"? LMAO

Maybe if they learned to speak straightforward language instead of all this bleep?

[yuzuha]

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@toomuchstuffagain35 wrote:

And Amazon is also laying off people.

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Many, many tech companies are. They got overzealous with hiring during the pandemic, thinking that the huge boom in online business was going to continue on forever.

Well, guess what, once people were allowed to go back out into the world again, it didn't.

[hartungcards]

macroeconomic headwinds are one of many unfortunate side effects of global warming.

[valueaddedresource]

The worst part for me is they put this out at the end of the day, but employees have to wait until tomorrow to find out if they are impacted and eBay is "requesting" all US employees work from home tomorrow so they can do this over Zoom instead of in person....and somehow they have the gall to say they are committed to treating everyone with respect and empathy. 😠

Also in light of the expenses outpacing growth thing, may be worth noting that Iannone had a total annual compensation of ~$17 Million in 2022, with the median employee’s annual total compensation for that same time about $136,754 - a pay ratio of 124:1.

Not to mention several questionable multi-million dollar acquisitions over the last few years like an NFT marketplace and a trading card subsidiary that has now mired eBay in an expensive and bad pr-inducing labor battle with their first US union and...so much more.

I have some ideas for the Board of where they should start when "considering making changes to better position eBay for long-term, sustainable growth" and most of them have titles that start with a C.

[a_c_green]

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@toomuchstuffagain35 wrote:

"scale back contracts with alternate workforces" - does that translate to off shore outsourced CS and IT?

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I saw that too. Those are two areas where eBay cannot afford to let things get even worse. They need to be turned around, not "scaled back."

[hartungcards]

"scale back contracts with alternate workforces"

I think that just means the lunchroom isn't going to get cleaned up every day anymore.

[wastingtime101]

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@toomuchstuffagain35 wrote:

"scale back contracts with alternate workforces" - does that translate to off shore outsourced CS and IT?

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A few months ago eBay removed the callback option from one of the primary help pages, which, in my opinion with no facts to back it up other than the change that took place, could point to them preparing for downsized CS phone service. Downsized even more than the big 2020 changes. 🤷