Oracle has laid off almost 30,000 employees worldwide around 12,000 mostly in India in a major blow to the global technology landscape, one report said. A lot of the workforce will be layoffs to Indians; it stands to be just under 40% for Oracle in India, where the company has an approximate 30,000 employees.
Oracle hasn't posted public statements on the recent layoffs so far. So in many ways this information came only from employees’ posts in the world of Reddit or TeamBlind for employment news, which has seen emotional messages about job losses going viral.
Layoffs Without Warning
What has particularly shocked employees is the manner in which layoffs were reportedly carried out. Workers said they received termination notices on email without proper warning, talking about it, or actually being in contact with management or HR at all.
“At most companies, layoffs are communicated through calls or meetings. But here, people are saying that they were informed through a simple email,” one post stated.
The most moving stories are of an employee who had worked for Oracle for 26 years and went into the office right away to receive a layoff email without even a courtesy phone call. One user said that their father, who had spent two decades with Oracle and was just two years away from retirement, was also laid off in an email despite health problems.
Immediate Access Revoked
Some employees said internal systems such as Slack, VPN, and corporate email accounts were taken out of service shortly after the notice, ending out of routine and with no time for any kind of transition. At least some of them described an awkward situation as quickly and hurtful for their employees to go there.
According to sources, these layoffs have considerably impacted Oracle India Development Centers like internal teams where workers have been seen to be cut, at least, significantly.
Compensation and Severance
For employees, Oracle is offering severance in an N + 2 form: “N + 2,” and it has to include pay equal to the number of years worked by an employee (N) but also two months as salary. Pay and benefits might even be included in this settlement, too.
Industry Impact
The layoffs come at a period of corporate restructuring across the global tech industry companies are looking at cost management and operational efficiency, at the same time as job security. But the scale and the timeliness with which Oracle’s layoffs were enacted have led to concerns about the corporate strategy of workers not knowing if they are not being employed and good communication with their bosses.
If true, it would potentially constitute one of the biggest layoffs that’s ever happened in the IT sector with the largest impact on India’s workforce as a whole.
As the affected employees tell their stories, industry observers wait for an official response from Oracle as to the situation and to know what happened.
