Ah yes, you're right, I forgot. Recruiting was frozen and so recruiting massacred as well as shared staffing that was hired in advance of hiring plans. From an eng perspective not having interviews constantly was like my favorite year at Google :).
Google doesn't often do company wide layoffs. Instead it'll kill of an entire department and tell the workers to find a new gig. They generally give 2-3 months after that you are on your own.
Since most of these are not public I won't name departments but it happens about once a year
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Since most of these are not public I won't name departments but it happens about once a year