If 2020 - 2021 is considered the peak of the information technology industry with the transition of many types of services from offline to online and the market transition to a new form is taking place very smoothly due to Due to the impact of the epidemic situation, in 2022, the situation will be completely different. A series of big names in the IT industry announced layoffs. The situation becomes even worse when businesses that were once praised as having dream remuneration policies, Google, Amazon, Facebook... also had to cut thousands to tens of thousands of employees. 

The impact of the wave of personnel cuts on businesses

That wave of cuts not only took place in the US but spread globally and also strongly affected economies in Southeast Asia when many offices closed, many companies reduced production and development activities. market development. In 2022, many technology companies in Southeast Asia will begin to tighten their budgets by temporarily suspending recruitment and drastically cutting staff. Especially in Singapore, Indonesia or Malaysia. Companies such as See Ltd (Shopeee's parent company), Grab Company, virtual currency exchange Crypto.com, and Malaysian technology unicorn Carsome, the car sales trading platform, all stopped/decelerated recruitment. and lay off thousands of employees in 2022.

And the wave of layoffs is getting stronger in 2023, when right at the beginning of the year, a series of companies announced staff reductions with numbers ranging from several hundred to several thousand, even tens of thousands of employees. And many companies clearly announced that this is just the beginning, they need to restructure costs, and focus resources on top priorities for both 2023 and 2024. 

The reason why the "job paradise" - the information technology industry has to "painfully" cut its meat, while just over a year ago the thirst for human resources in the information technology industry has become worse. hotter than ever. Experts of Group 101 Human Resource Management identify:

First of all, it is the general situation in the market When the world economy is strongly affected by epidemics, wars, energy shortages, rising interest rates, etc., all of which cause costs to skyrocket, profits to decline, and even revenues that are not enough to cover expenses. . Meanwhile, the global economic outlook continues to deteriorate.

Second is the overheating development of the information technology industry during a widespread pandemic from 2018 to 2021. Demand for online products skyrocketed following lockdown and working from home. And when the epidemic is controlled, people gradually return to normal life with pre-pandemic habits. Rising interest rates further squeeze the cash flow that technology companies are relying on to create future breakthroughs. According to CNN, if 2022 is considered the year that the prosperous period of technology companies ends, 2023 could become the year that things get worse.

See more specialized human resource management solutions for the IT industry here 

In Vietnam, up to this point it seems that this wave has not greatly affected the Vietnamese technology market both in 2022 and 2023. In fact, there are already a number of foreign technology businesses operating. Operations in Vietnam have carried out mass layoffs of employees according to the parent company's decision to preserve business investment capital. However, technology experts and businesses believe that human resources in this industry in Vietnam still have many opportunities to develop as domestic and world technology companies increasingly shift investment and recruit personnel to Vietnam. South, where there are quality human resources and salaries that are only ⅙ of the salaries in Silicon Valley.

In addition, investment capital in the IT field will also increase rapidly in 2021 and 2022. Many large Vietnamese enterprises such as FPT, CMC, TMA Solution are still increasing recruitment in domestic and foreign markets. . The number of startups in the technology sector is also increasing rapidly, and the number of investment funds pouring into Vietnam in 2022 has reached nearly 200 funds. Many large companies and large technology corporations are also committed to future development in Vietnam, for example Samsung inaugurated the largest R&D Center in Southeast Asia in Hanoi with a total investment of 220 million USD. la. All of these things have increased the demand for information technology human resources in Vietnam's labor market. And the fact that the world's technology corporations are having difficulty laying off many employees will cause more disadvantages in recruiting personnel because to optimize costs, corporations will shift more recruitment to low-cost markets such as India and Vietnam. 

Lessons learned for IT businesses and human resources workers

So what will IT businesses and human resources workers in particular learn from this story:

1. Pay attention to the market flow of human resource needs, remote work jobs with attractive salaries will attract Vietnamese talents and those are also the talents that any technology company wants to retain. 

2. Understand your needs clearly of technology engineers about their desire to update, learn, advance, have a flexible, stable working environment, and satisfactory remuneration. Once you clearly understand your human resources, businesses and especially the HR department need to consider implementing:

• Provide training and learning programs on new skills and new technologies to keep engineers up to date on new trends in the technology industry.
• Create internal promotion opportunities including direct promotion, rotation, transition to new positions, appointment as head of technology projects.
• Build flexible and appropriate remuneration regimes in each stage.

3. Recruitment: this is a great opportunity to recruit personnel in foreign markets instead of just focusing on Vietnam. High quality IT human resources in Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia, India,... and including Vietnamese human resources abroad.

The wave of personnel cuts directly affects the benefits of workers

For workers. The layoff stories of large corporations in the world have also shown remarkable lessons. Simple, conventional, repetitive jobs will be the first to be replaced when there is a recession (especially when Artificial Intelligence - Like AI GPT or AI Notion can code difficult commands). medium). Areas where costs are high but do not create much value also have a similar fate. Therefore, technology engineers need to invest time and effort to improve their knowledge about new trends that are popular in the CNT industry. This can include taking additional courses online or taking advantage of open resources, attending technology events to meet and learn from experts, and interning or participating in real-world projects. There are new technologies available. Additionally, technologists need to build relationships with employers, experts and the technology community, by participating in online groups, forums and events. This will keep them up to date on job opportunities and recruitment inquiries from businesses, and give them the opportunity to introduce themselves and showcase their experience.

See more: How will the recent wave of tech layoffs affect the global IT labor market?

END

The world will increasingly change dramatically with the rapid development of information technology. In the future, prominent information technology trends such as Artificial Intelligence, geographical maps, data security, data synchronization, etc. will bring the IT industry to a new level. Information technology companies need to update and learn new technologies and developing trends in fields, especially those related to optimizing costs and increasing labor productivity. . They should also proactively seek new opportunities and innovate their products and services to create new values for customers and the market. And to do that, companies need to have attraction and retention policies that truly attract talent, the most important "competitive advantage" in the information technology field. 

Thank you expert Hong Duyen 

Thank you for your useful sharing Hong Duyen - PhD. Economics, corporate management consultant about her perspective on the painful topic - layoffs for all businesses in general and IT businesses in particular. By having many years of working at large corporations: Vingroup, Doji, OCD, VMG,... She has helped readers understand more deeply about the reality of how the world's wave of personnel cuts affects the world. Vietnamese businesses and how to deal with it, thank you for investing the time and effort to write this quality article. Wishing you more health and success in the future!

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