Rivian left hundreds of its staff in limbo after saying it was shedding 10% of its salaried employees on Wednesday.
Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe informed employees they’d have to attend to seek out out whether or not their position had been impacted till Thursday morning, after notifying employees of the cuts on Wednesday, in keeping with a duplicate of the e-mail obtained by Business Insider.
Scaringe stated employees could be notified between 7:30 and eight a.m. Pacific Time on Thursday. But information of the layoffs broke on Wednesday afternoon.
“We know the timing here is difficult — waiting between now and tomorrow to understand whether you’re impacted is far from ideal, but we want to ensure a considerate notification process that accommodates all time zones,” the e-mail reads.
In an electronic mail to BI, Rivian didn’t specify precisely what number of salaried employees members could be reduce, however stated that it has 16,700 complete staff, together with each salaried and hourly staff.
An organization spokesperson did not reply to a request for touch upon the timeline of the layoff notices.
“Our business is facing a challenging macroeconomic environment—including historically high interest rates and geopolitical uncertainty—and we need to make purposeful changes now to ensure our promising future,” Scaringe informed employees through electronic mail. “We’ve recently implemented several organizational and leadership changes, but we need to do more to achieve our strategic priorities,” the e-mail continued.
Rivian is becoming a member of a rising record of tech corporations to put off employees this 12 months.
The carmaker’s technique of letting staff stew a complete night time earlier than letting them know which roles have been eradicated seems to be an uncommon one. Over the previous 12 months, tech corporations have alerted staff to a change of their position by means of all method of measures, from Google staff who discovered they’d been terminated after they have been unable to badge into the workplace to Twitter employees members who reportedly discovered they’d misplaced their jobs once they have been abruptly reduce off from firm programs.
More generally, staff obtain a notification to talk with human assets or a supervisor concurrently or shortly after a companywide electronic mail.
It’s the carmaker’s third layoff over the previous two years. The firm is considered one of many within the EV trade to make cuts amid slowing demand. Both Ford and General Motors have already begun to reduce their EV plans. High rates of interest, slowing demand, and strain from Tesla’s pricing technique have put strain on the US electrical automobile market.
“Our business is not immune to existing economic and geopolitical uncertainties,” Scaringe stated on Wednesday in the course of the firm’s earnings name. “Most notably the impact of historically high interest rates which has negatively impacted demand.”