Meta layoffs: Mark Zuckerberg's company eliminates thousands of managerial roles, to move 7,000 employees to ...

Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp will layoff around 10% of its global workforce on may 20, according to an internal memo seen by news agency Reuters. These job cuts are part of a sweeping restructuring which is aimed at embedding artificial intelligence into the company’s workflows and flattening its organisational structure.

As reported by Reuters, chief people officer Janelle Gale told employees that Meta will eliminated thousands of managerial roles and also reassign 7,000 employees to new AI-focused initiatives. “Many orgs can now operate with a flatter structure, with smaller pods or cohorts that move faster and with more ownership,” Gale wrote in an internal memo.The restructuring reflects Meta’s broader push to center AI agents in both its products and internal operations.

The company has already closed 6,000 open roles and instructed North American employees to work remotely on May 20, the day layoffs are scheduled.

Meta transferring 7,000 employees to AI units

Along with the elimination of managerial roles, Meta also detailed that employees are being ‘drafted’ into initiatives such as:

These transfers, combined with layoffs, will affect about 20% of Meta’s workforce.

Employee backlash

The changes have sparked protests inside Meta. More than 1,000 employees signed a petition against the installation of mouse-tracking software used to train AI models.

Staff have also posted flyers in offices and flooded internal Workplace posts with images of elephants, urging executives to address the “elephant in the room” — the layoffs.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg pushes back on the AI-replaces-humans narrative

Even with 10% of Meta's workforce on the chopping block, Mark Zuckerberg recently distanced himself from the gloomier AI-and-jobs framing other CEOs have leaned into this year. "AI isn't going to replace people," he told the call, arguing the technology will amplify what individuals can do rather than wipe them out.

That stance puts him at odds with Block CEO Jack Dorsey, who explicitly tied his company's 40% workforce cut to AI progress in February.For Meta employees, the distinction may feel academic. The company has rolled out an internal tracking tool called Model Capability Initiative that records keystrokes, clicks, and mouse movements to train AI agents. It is grading staff on AI use in performance reviews. Some teams now run with one manager for every 50 engineers, a structure Meta internally calls "ultraflat." According to anonymous posts on Blind, internal sentiment at the company is at its lowest on record.Zuckerberg's pitch is clear enough. Meta wants the operators who can build alone what teams used to build together—and is ready to let the rest go.