According to a new report from The Information, Instagram has laid off 60 technical project manager positions and laid off an entire management team at the company. Affected employees have two months to apply for other jobs at the company. After two months, their employment will be terminated if they are unable to secure another position with the company.
A former Instagram employee posted on LinkedIn that some technical project managers may be "re-interviewing for PM positions" or project manager positions.
A Meta spokesman declined to comment on the layoffs. The spokesperson revealed a March 2023 blog post by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg about the company's "Year of Efficiency," in which he said Meta would focus on improving financial performance and reducing staff.
Instagram also notified employees of a product team shakeup as the company decided to create three new areas of focus for the team responsible for helping people create and share content on the social network, The Information reported. The three new focus areas are "Creation", "Creator" and "Friend Sharing".
The changes mean Instagram will be more focused on supporting the creators most likely to drive teen engagement on the platform. It's no surprise that Instagram wants its staff to focus on creators who can retain a teenage audience on the platform, but the change comes as more than 40 states sue Meta, accusing the company's service of causing mental health problems among teenage users.
The lawsuit claims that over the past decade, Meta has "profoundly changed the psychological and social reality of a generation of young Americans" and is using "unprecedentedly powerful technologies to seduce, attract, and ultimately enslave teenagers."
While Meta is focusing on youth engagement, it is also scheduled to testify before the Senate on January 31 on child safety issues along with X (formerly Twitter), TikTok, Snap, and Discord. Committee members are expected to press executives on the companies' platforms over shortcomings in protecting children online.
Despite ongoing regulatory pressure on Meta, Instagram remains focused on teen engagement and retention.
However, Meta appears to be hoping to appease lawmakers with its recent changes in youth safety. Earlier this week, Meta revealed that it would begin automatically limiting the type of content that teen Instagram and Facebook accounts can see on the social network. As part of the reforms, teen accounts will be restricted from viewing harmful content such as posts about self-harm, violence and eating disorders.