Mark Zuckerberg’s “year of efficiency” initiative at Meta that’s seen the tech giant slash costs and workers has reportedly leaked into the tech mogul’s philanthropic organization, which he heads up with his wife, Priscilla Chan.
The couple’s Chan Zuckerberg Initiative handed pink slips to about four dozen staffers on Wednesday, two people familiar with the company told Insider.
The 74 — a nonprofit news site co-founded by Meta’s vice president of media partnerships Campbell Brown — reported that the job cuts impacted members of CZI’s education team.
CZI, headed by Chan, had a workforce of 450 in 2020, according to the Washington Post. Current staffing levels were not available.
CZI spokesman Raymonde Charles confirmed the layoffs to The 74, one of the nearly 1,000 companies that CZI has funded.
Representatives for CZI did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.
All affected employees were offered the same severance package, which includes 16 weeks of base pay, continued health insurance and a $10,000 stipend, a source told The 74.
Axed staffers also received a prorated portion of their 2023 bonus.
According to recruiting site and anonymous company review platform Glassdoor, the CZI workers make anywhere from $96,805 annually as an executive assistant to $390,326 per year as a director.
Workers in the education department “build tools that help teachers center students’ well-being in support of academic achievement and success,” and “help educators understand what’s working in schools,” among other things, the organization’s website says.
“Guided by insights from our grantees, research and educators, our work in education continues to evolve, and the structure of our teams has changed as a result. We remain committed to helping educators give every student exactly what they need to thrive inside the classroom and beyond,” Charles said.
Zuckerberg and Chan, who met as undergrads at Harvard University and wed in 2012 founded their Redwood City, Calif.-based philanthropic organization in 2015.
They have three daughters: Maxima, 7; August, 5; and 5-month-old Aurelia.
Upon the organization’s founding, the couple pledged to put 99% of their Facebook shares into the company which, in 2015, was valued at $45 billion. Meta, Facebook’s parent company, has a current value of nearly $800 billion.
According to Forbes, 39-year-old Zuckerberg is worth an estimated $108.1 billion, while 38-year-old Chan’s fortune is not listed.
Meta has cut 21,000 jobs since last November. In February, Zuckerberg said the social-media giant will make 2023 the “year of efficiency” — and went on to lay off 6,000 workers and slash 10,000 jobs in May.