Tuesday, January 31, 2023

PySpark's reduceByKey Method, Word count and Line count Programs

pyspark.RDD.reduceByKey()

Merge the values for each key using an associative and commutative reduce function.

What is the associative property? 
The associative property is a math rule that says that the way in which factors are grouped in a multiplication problem does not change the product.

What is the commutative property? 
The commutative property is a math rule that says that the order in which we multiply numbers does not change the product.

spark.apache.org/docs

Note: This program can also be used to compute the number of duplicate occurrences of records in a dataset Tags: Spark,Technology,

Monday, January 30, 2023

Chris Williams (former HR exec at Microsoft) shares 3 types of employees at most risk during layoffs

Here are 3 types of employees at most risk during layoffs. And, two categories of employees who are at least risk of being laid off. 
By: Chris Williams (former HR exec at Microsoft)

Following Microsoft's announcement on January 18 to lay off 10,000 employees, accounting for almost 5 percent of its global workforce, a former vice-president of the human resources at the company shared three categories of employees who are at most risk of being fired and two of the safest categories.

Chris Williams, who is now a podcaster, consultant and TikTok creator told Business Insider, "Every industry, company, even department has a different risk, but some areas are more vulnerable than others." He then listed the three most unsafe categories.

1) Contract workers 

"At the extreme end of the risk spectrum are contract employees. One of the main reasons companies use temporary or contract workers is for this very contingency. They want to remain flexible in case of a downturn," Williams told the publication.

2) Employees associated with new initiatives 

When companies decide to explore new avenues during a good phase, they tend to hire employees for these new initiatives. Such employees too are at risk during layoffs if the company decides to play it safe. "Unless the company is making a concerted effort to pivot entirely to these new areas, these kinds of new initiatives are often the first ones cut when times are leaner," Williams told Business Insider.

3) Employees associated with event planning 

According to Williams, events and luxury activities are quick to be axed when companies find themselves in a tight spot, making employees who handle events at risk of layoffs. "If you are involved in planning events, for example, those are some of the first things that companies cut when times get tight. People who are part of providing such services are at high risk of being laid off," Williams said.

He then went on to add the two categories of employees who are at least risk.

1) Profit-making employees 

"If you're an essential part of building the most profitable product for your company, your layoff risk is low. When retreating to the core business, companies turn to the quality products that make money," Williams told Business Insider. If employees are essential to one of those products, the company would not risk incurring losses if such staff are fired.

2) Human resources staff 

"HR is essential in the layoff process, and finance is often relied on as the financial status gets more scrutiny. As such, these areas are rarely the source of major cuts in most layoffs," Williams added.
Tags: Management,

Layoffs Report (Jan 2023)

Tech Layoffs Since 2022-23

Tech Layoffs Since Covid-19 (Q1 2020)

Breakup by industry since Covid-19 (Q1-2020)

Biggest tech layoffs by Jan 2023

Headlines

1. Jan/30/2023: Philips cuts 6,000 jobs just months after laying off 4,000 employees. Dutch health technology company Philips said on Monday it would let go off 6,000 employees globally in order to restore the company’s profitability on the back of a recall of respiratory devices. The recall, however, took place last year but still has a rippling effect on the company. This is the second round of layoffs at Philips after a recall. The company cut over 4,000 jobs in October last year. 2. On Jan. 4, Amazon announced it would lay off 18,000 workers, or 5% of its corporate staff. This is the largest round of layoffs announced since the pandemic started, and it was 8,000 higher than initially expected when the ecommerce giant confirmed back in November that it would be implementing job cuts. 3. Google's parent company, Alphabet, said it will be laying off 12,000 employees, or around 6% of its workforce, making this the second-largest round of layoffs since the onset of the pandemic. Among the laid-off workers, several of them had been long-tenured or recently promoted, according to CNBC. 4. On Jan. 18, Microsoft announced it would be cutting 10,000 jobs, or approximately 5% of its workforce. Microsoft also made multiple job cuts last year, with the technology corporation announcing it would lay off less than 1% of its staff on July 12 and also confirming another 1,000 jobs would be cut on Oct. 17, per CNBC and Axios, respectively. 5. Following Meta's 11,000 cut back in November, Microsoft layoffs is the fourth-largest round of layoffs since the pandemic began. 6. Also on Jan. 4, Salesforce said it plans to cut 8,000 jobs, or 10% of its staff, in addition to reducing its office space. 7. IBM announced on Jan. 25 that it plans to cut around 3,900 jobs, or approximately 1.5% of its global workforce, though it expects to continue hiring in "higher growth areas," according to Bloomberg. 8. Multinational software company SAP said on Jan. 26 that it plans to layoff 3,000 employees, or 2.5% of its global workforce. 9. On Jan. 20, online furniture retailer Wayfair announced it will be laying off approximately 1,750 workers, or 10% of its staff. 10. On Jan. 24, vacation rental management company Vacasa announced in company-wide email that it will cut 1,300 jobs, representing 17% of its workforce. 11. On Jan. 10, Coinbase said it plans to reduce its workforce by 20%, or 950 employees. 12. Multinational software company Amdocs decided to let go of 3% of its workforce, or 700 people, on Jan. 2, making it the first tech company in 2023 to implement mass job cuts. Ref: investopedia 13. Elon Musk's Twitter announced further job cuts in 2023, saying that it will let go of 3700 more employees. 14. Swiggy CEO Srihisha Majety in an internal note to employees said that the company will lay off 380 employees. 15. Byju's has been cutting jobs left and right over the past few months. This year, it would cut - or "rationalize" - about 5% of it's 50,000-strong workforce. 16. Ridehailing app Ola also joined the bandwagon, announcing that it had sacked 130-200 of its employees in a fresh round of layoffs. Ref: economictimes 17. Even IT giant Wipro has laid off more than 400 fresher employees for poor performance in internal assessment tests. Ref: economictimes (17) 18. Spotify (600 job cuts) "Like many other leaders, I hoped to sustain the strong tailwinds from the pandemic and believed that our broad global business and lower risk to the impact of a slowdown in ads would insulate us. "In hindsight, I was too ambitious in investing ahead of our revenue growth," says Daniel Ek, Spotify's CEO. Ref: economictimes (18) 19. Ecommerce firm Dealshare has laid off around 100 employees, or over 6% of its 1,500-strong workforce, according to multiple people aware of the development. Dealshare, backed by Tiger Global and Alpha Wave Global, joins a growing number of startups that have fired employees in the new year to cut costs and rationalise operations. Ref: economictimes (19) 20. Apple is one exception. It strongly resisted increasing its head count in recent years and as a result doesn't have to shrink staff numbers (although it hasn't been immune to staff losses due to work-from-home policy changes). Ref: economictimes (20)

References

1. Tracking tech layoffs since COVID-19 2. How much are tech companies paying for talent?
Tags: Management,Investment,