Amazon CEO Andy Jassy Says The Recent Layoffs Of 14,000 People Was About ‘Culture’ And Not Financially- Or AI-Driven
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy addressed the company’s recent layoffs during its quarterly earnings call on Oct. 30, saying the decision to cut 14,000 corporate positions was based on cultural factors rather than financial or AI-related reasons, Fortune reports.
“The announcement that we made a few days ago was not really financially driven, and it’s not even really AI-driven, not right now at least,” he said during the call. “It’s culture.”
The Amazon layoffs, which largely affected middle management, followed a June 2025 memo, according to a previous Fortune report. In it, Jassy said that advancements in AI have increased efficiency across the company. In a separate internal communication, Beth Galetti, Amazon’s senior vice president of people experience and technology, described the restructuring as an effort to adjust to the “transformative technology” of AI.
Amazon’s workforce has grown significantly in recent years. The company currently employs about 1.55 million people worldwide, including roughly 350,000 in corporate roles, Reuters reports. In comparison, filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission show that Amazon had 798,000 employees at the end of 2019, per Fortune.
“If you grow as fast as we did for several years, the size of businesses, the number of people, the number of locations, the types of businesses you’re in, you end up with a lot more people than what you had before, and you end up with a lot more layers,” Jassy said.
He added, “Sometimes without realizing it, you can weaken the ownership of the people that you have who are doing the actual work and who own most of the two-way door decisions, the ones that should be made quickly and right at the front line.”
As AFROTECH™ previously reported, Amazon reduced about 14,000 corporate roles on Oct. 28 as part of a broader workforce adjustment. That move followed similar reductions made across multiple departments beginning in 2023 as the company restructured teams and reevaluated staffing needs in its retail, human resources, and cloud computing divisions, according to CNN.
Amazon is among several large companies, including Salesforce, Target, and Paramount, that have announced recent workforce reductions. While some organizations have cited automation and shifting business needs, data shows that AI-related cuts remain limited.
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell noted, per Fortune, that the central bank is observing how AI adoption may affect hiring and job stability. A recent Goldman Sachs study found that only 11% of surveyed companies had reduced staff due to AI, while about one-third of firms in the technology, media, and telecommunications industries reported headcount reductions linked to it.
During the earnings call, according to Fortune, Jassy said the company intends to remain efficient and adaptable in a changing business environment.
“It’s important to be lean, it’s important to be flat, and it’s important to move fast,” he said. “That’s what we’re going to do.”
