2023 and layoffs: What's in store for the world of business this year?

Dear Friend,

I know 2023 is not off to a great start. There have been huge layoffs and tens and thousands of lives have been affected. And this is not confined to only one country. The layoffs are happening all around the world and their impacts could be seen everywhere. But let's take a pause and see where 2022 was and how it changed at the beginning of 2023.

2022

2022 was one of the prolific years in which a lot transpired. Some events of interest are:

• The first successful heart transplant from a pig to a human
• The Russian invasion of Ukraine that began in February
• Ukraine's invasion led to talks of nuclear war and world war 3 that have never been heard in our news for almost many decades
• Covid's death toll surpassed 6 million
• For comparison, Spanish flu by estimates took the lives of more than 50 million
• Quiet quitting was on the rise
• Sri Lankan unrest caused the government to resign and appoint a new president
• Inflation was at a record high
• There was record funding of businesses and startups
• Huge demand for skilled labor so much that people quit immediately after joining for better pay

In fact, 2022 was quite the year when it comes to circumstances revolving around the business. There has been a good number of geo-political concerns and economical reasons that marred the last part of the year. Added to this, the Taiwan issues were adding fuel to the fire. So businesses that were coming out of the brutal Covid lockdowns for the previous two years, saw even more volatility.

One more thing to note is that the first half of the year had exceptional levels of funding for new startups and companies. And there were iconic IPO failures as well. This is all piling up for the year to come.

Introducing 2023

This year has started with the biggest negative news that anybody watching the economy can have - so many layoffs in the tech and other sectors. Recently Google's parent company laid off more than 10,000 people. Twitter laid off almost 75% of its workforce. Microsoft has also laid off thousands of employees.

2023, to be frank, is not to the best of the starts. While the economy is gloomy and geo-political issues are not looking great, what can 2023 offer you? 2023 can offer you the best if you plan properly. In terms of business, you can have the greatest growth if you move things in the right direction. In terms of learning, any down years are the best for retrospecting and learning. If you are laid off, do not worry too much about it. 2023 can also offer you the best - if you plan properly.

My earlier predictions

Last year I predicted that the following would happen:

1. EdTech will fail
2. 2022 will be the year that Covid stops
3. Hyper-local delivery startups need to turn a profit
4. The services industry is ripe for disruption

Source: https://twitter.com/jeygeethan/status/1496719036704604164

3 out of these 4 had come true. The last one is yet to happen, though I am pretty sure that with ChatGPT and other AI-related things, the services industry is ripe for disruption.

EdTech had many companies that closed shop and liquidate their assets. My reasoning was very simple - that which had more demand because of Covid will come down when covid goes down. It's simple reasoning and that is exactly what happened.

Predictions for this year

1. This year will be the year of the wars
2. Geo-political volatility will keep increasing
3. There will be a batch of layoffs happening in the first half of the year
4. Officially, 2023 will enter into a recession
5. Twitter will end being the favored social media platform and there will be new disruptors

All these predictions are based on logic and my mental model of the world. Maybe everything here will become true, but I am pretty at least half of them will true.

So what can you do?

Though the problems are seemingly much, there are a certain few things that you can definitely do.

If you are a business owner, you can:

1. Start planning on how to reallocate your budgets for the year considering that there will be a drop in your topline
2. To increase your revenues, you can look at how to move into adjacent business verticals where you can make more sales
3. Look at how to optimize your low-key areas and get the most out of your business
4. Look at your hiring and understand how you can optimize for the year

If you are a salaried person, you can:

1. Cut down your unnecessary bills
2. Prepare a safety fund, that in case you are affected by layoffs, you can rely on
3. Keep learning new skills and upgrading yourself so that it's easier for your employer to keep you around

If you are a laid-off person, you can:

1. Start understanding how economies work. This is very essential. Read some books and listen to podcasts. You didn't get laid off because you lacked skills, but because the economy was down under
2. Learn new adjacent skills. You have udemy, LinkedIn learning, and so many other platforms
3. If you have a safety fund, keep it ready. But before starting to use that, of course, try to apply for new jobs.
4. Take up freelancing jobs
5. Lastly, you can always start a new business

Businesses that have been started during the downturn of the economy have been the best and the greatest. Example: Disney, Ford.

At last, 2023 will be a good year...

if you plan really well. Also, keep on the lookout and subscribe to my newsletter since I will be expanding on all these points in later articles. I will write about how I set up my own businesses and started my career in writing as a novelist. Keep watching!