Meta Platforms Inc started carrying out the last batch of a three-part round of layoffs on Wednesday, May 24. Professional networking platform LinkedIn has since been flooded with dozens of posts from Meta employees impacted by the layoffs.
Particularly hard-hit are Meta employees working in the US on an H1B visa, who now have limited time to find new jobs in the country or face deportation. One such person is Kushal Naidu, a Texas-based program manager at the social media giant.
Naidu, who graduated in 2006 from Sardar Patel College of Engineering in 2006, has worked in the US for over a decade. On Thursday, he announced on LinkedIn that he had been impacted by the latest round of layoffs at Facebook’s parent company, Meta, and asked for help in finding a new job which could sponsor his H1B visa.
“After an incredible 20 month journey as a Trust & Safety, Program Manager at Meta, I have been impacted by the most recent round of layoffs. I'm actively seeking new opportunities in Program Management, Data Engineering and Data Analytics,” he wrote.
“I am in the US on a work visa(H1B) and therefore, I need to find a job soon,” Naidu added, asking his LinkedIn contacts to help him in his job search.
Naidu is not the only NRI impacted by Meta layoffs – data specialist Sneha Agarwal was also laid off from her job of three years.
“Today I join the pool of many thousands of talented people laid-off by Meta,” Agarwal announced in her LinkedIn post. “I am looking for new data science & analytics/Analytics Program Manager roles with a company that is willing to sponsor work visa (H1b),” she added.
Agarwal is also based in Texas for her role at Meta. She graduated from the National Institute of Technology, Jamshedpur, in 2012.
Meta in March became the first Big Tech company to announce a second round of mass layoffs, after showing more than 11,000 employees the door in the fall. The cuts brought the company's headcount down to where it stood as of about mid-2021, following a hiring spree that doubled its workforce since 2020.
Meta Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg in March said that the bulk of the layoffs in the company's second round would take place in three "moments" over several months, largely finishing in May. Some smaller rounds could continue after that, he said.
(With inputs from Reuters)
