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Add The California Post on Google Mark Zuckerberg was ready to pull the plug — then a revolt stopped him in his tracks.
New details have surfaced of those plans involving tech giant Meta Platforms, which owns Facebook and Instagram, revealing the ambitious goal to use artificial intelligence to take over the role of many staffers. Zuckerberg and top executives hatched a plan, codenamed Project OT (Organization Transformation), that envisioned AI reshaping the company’s workforce radically.
Under that plan, small, “talent-dense” groups of human staffers would oversee virtual workers, according to internal documents seen by Reuters. Teams that consisted of 10-20 people would be dramatically reduced to 3-5 people armed with AI tools.
To execute the plan, executives had planned slashing as much as 60% of many teams on the workforce that could result in huge layoffs. A first purge would happen in May and a second in November, planning documents revealed.
In addition, open job positions would be closed and poor performers would be targeted. Meta launched a human resources tool to identify “irreplacable talent,” or extremely talented people who could do the work of an entire team with AI.
But that plan didn’t go as expected. A layoff happened in May but the November one was called off.
Employees reportedly revolted after news came out about impending layoffs.
One lawsuit filed by more than two dozen employees accused the company of using an internal AI platform to select targets, disproportionately targeting those with disabilities.
News that Meta was requiring tracking software on employee devices to teach AI agents further infuriated workers who feared they were being replaced. Many employees left messages on internal platforms expressing anger and some mocking executives.
Meta’s internal measure of employee sentiment dropped from 74% favorable to 55% favorable, according to a company survey.
There were also technical concerns that Project OT may not go as envisioned. Technical and security incidents, such as service disruptions and possible data leaks, surged due to overreliance on unchecked AI agents, Reuters reported.
Questions about the AI’s productivity also surfaced, according to internal posts.
All that led Zuckerberg to change course and his tone. He made an appearance at a company town hall in July and made some concessions. AI agent technology, the CEO said, had not “accelerated” as quickly as he had anticipated.
The company is currently on a blitz to emphasize Meta as people-centric.
“We are the only major company focusing on empowering people and putting the power of this new technology in billions of people’s hands across all our products – rather than primarily focusing on automating work,” he said in an internal post.
Meta confirmed Project OT existed in a statement to Reuters but claimed it never intended to layoff 60% of its workforce.
“As part of our company restructuring earlier this year, we asked some teams to conduct a scenario planning exercise looking at the potential impact of redeployments, open role closures and cuts,” Meta said.
“This ultimately resulted in moving thousands of employees to do priority work on several newly-established teams, as has been publicly reported. Ultimately, we didn’t move forward with every scenario from the exercise – and it was never assumed we would.”
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