Indeed and Glassdoor, the job search and employee review firms, are slashing a total of roughly 1,300 jobs as their parent company, Japan’s Recruit Holdings, embraces artificial intelligence.
In an email to employees Thursday, Recruit Holdings CEO Hisayuki “Deko” Idekoba said that “AI is changing the world” and that the company must adapt accordingly. The layoffs represent about 6% of Recruit Holdings’ workforce.
The cuts will target the companies’ research and development, as well as “people & sustainability,” teams in the U.S., but other areas and regions will also be affected, according to Recruit Holdings. The company will send notices to employees who are losing their jobs on Thursday.
The move reflects Recruit Holdings’ focus on using AI to transform how job-seekers look for work and how employers handle recruitment. As part of that effort, the company will fold Glassdoor operations into Indeed, the company told CBS MoneyWatch. Glassdoor CEO Christian Sutherland-Wong is stepping down.
“[W]hen we think about HR industry, which is $300 billion-plus industry, but it includes like 60% or 65% of human labor manual cost. It’s very difficult to find that big industry with such a high percentage of human labor manual cost,” Idekoba said in May at a JPMorgan Chase technology conference. “And so what we believe is, basically, how can we simplify hiring with using AI and technology and data to reduce manual work. That’s what we are focusing on.”
He added that about one-third of the company’s new programming code is written by AI, and that he expects that figure to jump to one-half. “It’s going to be 50% pretty soon,” he said.
The layoffs come as corporate leaders tout AI’s capabilities, while some experts warn that the technology could lead to job losses. Speaking in June at the the Aspen Ideas Festival, for example, Ford CEO Jim Farley said AI is likely to replace half of all white-collar workers in the U.S.