Tencent Fakes Layoffs
According to the article, Tencent isn’t actually laying people off; it’s reorganizing its workforce. After several rounds of reductions, headcount is still more than 4,000 higher than before. Most of those let go had consistently low performance or were highly paid yet easily replaceable—making them prime candidates for cost cuts.
From that angle, Tencent is a mature company, and its cost-cutting and efficiency drive could serve as a model for other businesses.
Related reading:Hard and Soft Skills in the Workplace
During an expansion phase, two things matter most: scooping up talent and scaling fast. As long as you have money, poach the best people from the market—even if they don’t directly generate revenue, they at least keep competitors from getting them. And sometimes rapid growth genuinely requires bodies in seats.
From a certain perspective, having a front desk staffed entirely by Peking University graduates might seem like indulgence, but paying people to idle away time can make sense—if only because that “worth it” calculation will eventually flip when costs force a reset.