Microsoft employees express concerns over the company’s leadership in a leaked poll
Microsoft employees aren’t impressed with the company’s leadership.
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What you need to know
Microsoft’s current state of leadership isn’t inspiring a lot of confidence among its employees, at least according to a leaked internal pollspotted by the Insider.
Admittedly, the company’s workforce has taken quite a hit since the year began. In January, Microsoft’s CEO, Satya Nadella, indicated that the company willcut 10,000 jobs by the end of FY23 Q3. The CEO indicated that the company was facing a different economic reality, with a significant reduction in spending post the COVID-19 pandemic.
And while the layoff phase will probably run its course throughout the year, Microsoft also announced thatemployees won’t get a pay raise this year. In the leaked email highlighting the change, Nadella indicated it was due to tough “economic conditions.”
As such, the change negatively affected the employees' performance index and morale. This also caused the employees to have mixed emotions over the company and its leadership based on their decision-making. Perhaps, these are some of the issues that might have contributed to the not-so-good responses to the poll.
Leading up to this situation, Microsoft had already closed down its annual poll called “Employee Signals,” where employees would get the opportunity to express their thoughts about the company.
Compared to Microsoft’s poll last year over the company’s leadership, 73% of the employees that took part in the activity think the company is doing a great job. Still, it’s a significant drop from last year’s 78% bet on the company.
Per the poll results, the employees didn’t seem to think that working at Microsoft is a “good idea.'' In fact, of all the questions featured in the poll, this question received the highest number of negative responses, with 69% of the employees citing that it is a good deal.
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That’s a 3% bump from last year’s 66% favorable responses to the question. In 2021, 73% of the employees indicated it was a great opportunity to work at Microsoft. The margin between 2021’s responses and 2022’s prompted the company to announce pay rises for the employees, as disclosed by sources with a good read on the matter.
The insidershared Microsoft employees' sentimentsin response to the poll results, as highlighted below:
“Deal at Microsoft was the lowest scored prompt I saw in every leader’s Signals review. What is leadership doing in response to this data point?,” one employee asked.
“Signals results have shown that the top employee concern and negative sentiment involves compensation. Yet recent news from Satya informed us that we will not be receiving merit bonuses this year. How do you reconcile this?” another asked.
Consequently, when asked if they’d remain at Microsoft if they got a better offer elsewhere in a daily poll after the compensation shake-ups, less than half of the employees indicated that they’d retain their positions at Microsoft.
It’ll be interesting to see the measures the company puts in place to mitigate this issue to ensure that their employees are happy and confident with Microsoft and its leadership.
Kevin Okemwa is a seasoned tech journalist based in Nairobi, Kenya with lots of experience covering the latest trends and developments in the industry at Windows Central. With a passion for innovation and a keen eye for detail, he has written for leading publications such as OnMSFT, MakeUseOf, and Windows Report, providing insightful analysis and breaking news on everything revolving around the Microsoft ecosystem. You’ll also catch him occasionally contributing at iMore about Apple and AI. While AFK and not busy following the ever-emerging trends in tech, you can find him exploring the world or listening to music.
