“A challenging period.”

That’s how Mark Zuckerberg described in a memo what the near future will be like for Meta employees after he announced the once-impervious social media company will cut another 10,000 jobs in the months ahead.

Zuckerberg, who has been conducting a review of the business as he aims to execute on his so-called “year of efficiency,” outlined key changes that will be implemented across the organization. Most importantly, from a structural standpoint, Zuckerberg said he wants to flatten the company “by removing multiple layers of management.”

“This will be tough and there’s no way around that,” Zuckerberg said in his memo, hinting at the pain and raw emotion that will soon envelope the organization as the workforce is slashed yet again.

The cuts to the parent of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp come after it laid off about 11,000 employees in November, which at the time represented the company’s first-ever workforce reduction. Coupled with the new cuts, Meta will have cut about 24% of its workforce, or one in four employees, in just about half a year.

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Meta, in particular, has been battling some of the most severe headwinds in Silicon Valley. The company has had to grapple with an ever-weakening digital advertising sector amid broader economic turmoil, Apple’s unforgiving new privacy policy, the rapid emergence of artificial intelligence technologies, and the seemingly unstoppable rise of TikTok.

Nevertheless, the layoff announcements have naturally sent morale at the Menlo Park-headquartered company plummeting. The latest announcement, in particular, has left already anxious employees distressed and wondering whether they might be on the chopping block in the near future.

But Zuckerberg signaled that the sweeping changes are necessary to survive in what he characterized as a deteriorating economy that will not soon heal.

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