Last year, amid its name change to Meta, Facebook was seen as one of the worst companies in the world. With multiple court cases, privacy concerns, a whistleblower, a controversial metaverse focus and more, the Mark Zuckerberg company was massively hated across the globe.
After a year that made employees feel like an “army under siege”, a horde of employees are leaving the company in a mass exodus. Despite this, CEO Mark Zuckerberg believes that more employees leaving will make for a better company.
Mark Zuckerberg on employee departure
Via Insider, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg admitted that Facebook is haemorrhaging employees. Discussed in the company's Q1 2022 financial call, the CEO explained that the social media company is having an issue with employee retention.
The CEO admitted that one of the main causes for concern at the company is its new metaverse focus. While that shift wasn't an issue during COVID, as the pandemic dissipates, many are unsure if they want to work in that field.
“During Covid, we saw the attrition level go down a lot because people didn't want to get new jobs,” Zuckerberg said. “A lot of people stayed at the company that didn't care that much about what we were doing, compared to what we would have wanted. I'm just trying to lead the company in a way where we position ourselves as the premier company for building the future of social interaction and the metaverse, and if you care about those things, we're getting the best people to come work here."
The Meta CEO also explained that he believes the mass employee exodus isn't bad for the company. He said: “We'll see attrition go up and down over time, but I think we're doing ok now. Over the long term, I think it's going to make us a better company."
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Loss on top of loss
Meta’s employee departure issues aren't the only losses at the massive tech company as of late. While Meta has lost employees in sectors ranging from social media development to high end artificial intelligence research, its metaverse project is also incredibly expensive.
In Meta's Q1 2022 financials, it was revealed that metaverse development resulted in a $3 billion loss in that quarter alone. This comes after metaverse development lost $10 billion across 2021 in both hardware and software profits.
Meta is planning to continue its losses until 2030, keeping the metaverse as its primary focus. With multiple virtual reality and augmented reality headsets in development, Meta is hoping that the tech will get popular as it advances.
Of course, this long-term strategy is only something that can be attempted by a company as massive as Meta. It’s an incredibly privileged position, one that can have the company lose billions every year until the product takes off.