A leaked document has claimed Salesforce could be cutting even more jobs as it chases higher margins.
Seen by Business Insider (opens in new tab), the document, known as ‘Vision, Values, Methods, Obstacles, and Measurements’ (V2MOM) surfaces each year and is typically shared internally to give the CRM giant’s workers an indication of the company’s direction in the coming months.
This year, it seems that its direction is to significantly increase profit margins, which will likely result in more mass layoffs following the redundancies of 10% of the company’s workforce.
Salesforce redundancies
It’s estimated that around half of the company’s account executives bring in more than 95% of all sales, and in an effort to cut unnecessary spending as it moves to higher margins, Salesforce might be looking to get rid of some of its most unproductive workers.
The company’s fiscal year 2023 target for operating margins was 20%, which has been tweaked to the tune of 25% by fiscal year 2026. According to Business Insider, activist investor Starboard Value seems to be the one driving a 31.7%-plus margin, and that in the next two years.
All of this in an effort to catch up with better-performing companies like Oracle (43.3% margin) and Microsoft (46.6% margin).
An extract from the V2MOM draft reads: “Our margin growth is more important than revenue growth…”
That same document also reportedly asked managers to cut “bottom performers” by 5% a year as the company steers toward a more aggressive, performance-driven setup. It is thought that this figure has since been removed, asking managers instead to give employees a rating, rewarding top performers and cutting poor performers, to ensure the company’s “prosperous” future.
Benioff is said to have told workers in the company Slack channel that even this has been removed from the V2MOM, but it’s clear that the company has harsh targets for a financial reform.
