Microsoft is asking staff across the company to monitor spending more closely amid economic uncertainty.
Certain business trips, external trainings and corporate meetings all fall under the scrutiny of Redmond accountants.
In a recent case recounted by a loquacious but unidentified source, as reported by the Wall Street Journal, Microsoft officials personally paid the bill for food and watering staff at a picnic in the city. company, which the multi-billion dollar profit company would have covered itself before.
During a conference call last month on Microsoft’s financial results for its fourth quarter ended June 30, Chief Financial Officer Amy Hood said, “We will continue to invest in future growth while maintaining an intense focus on operational excellence and execution discipline”.
Also in July, Hood reportedly told staff at a company meeting to think twice before submitting expenses.
We asked Microsoft for comment.
Microsoft’s revenue rose 12% year-on-year to $51.9 billion in the fourth quarter, the slowest growth rate in two years, with some of the PC and consumer units posting single-digit gains and Intelligent Cloud up 26%, itself a relative slowdown.
CEO Satya Nadella said he still saw a “pretty strong demand signal”, adding: “Going into the pandemic, we have seen demand increase due to the strains the pandemic is placing on businesses and the activity increase in consumers.
“Coming out of the pandemic, we actually see a lot of constraints in the economy and the only resource, as I said in my remarks, that can help boost productivity while reducing costs is digital technology. “
Despite this, Microsoft recently closed unfilled vacancies in the cloud and security divisions, with the company saying it was ensuring “the right resources are aligned with the right opportunity” and insisting that she “will continue to increase staff numbers in the coming year”.
This follows a slowdown in hiring across Windows, Office and Teams units, and after Microsoft laid off less than 1% of its 180,000 employees as part of the annual cut.
Others in the industry are also acting cautiously. Apple, Cisco, Intel, Google and others are also putting recruiting on hold in parts of the business. Chip vendors are starting to issue warnings of an impending slowdown, including Nvidia and Micron, and storage giant Seagate recently revealed it is cutting production. ®
