LinkedIn Cuts About 10 Jobs in Australia as Part of Global Reduction

LinkedIn has implemented job cuts in Australia as part of a global reduction announced on Thursday. The Australian redundancies total about 10 positions, including members of the local senior leadership team. The moves form part of an approximate 5 per cent reduction to the company's workforce of more than 17,500 full-time staff worldwide.

The global cull is thought to number about 875 jobs. Two sources confirmed that some members of the Australian leadership team were affected. A company spokesman disputed the 5 per cent figure but declined to provide further details. "As part of our regular business planning, we've implemented organisational changes to best position ourselves for future success," the spokesman said.

LinkedIn's most recent disclosures from 2024 state that it employs about 350 staff in Australia, with offices in Sydney and Melbourne. The cuts come almost exactly one year after the company reduced its Australian editorial teams. Those teams were not targeted in the latest round.

LinkedIn reported accelerating revenue growth in its most recent quarter, with a 12 per cent year-on-year increase in revenue from recruiting tools and premium subscriptions.

The company's chief marketing officer, Jessica Jensen, outlined the changes in an internal memo. She stated that growth had become more competitive, infrastructure costs continued to rise and AI was reshaping how work gets done. The reorganisation rests on three pillars: reducing spending on paid media while focusing investment on high-return markets, expanding AI-powered hiring tools, premium subscriptions and small business offerings, and consolidating similar teams while embedding AI workflows.

"Our organisational changes are across three areas," Jensen wrote. " The job reductions are part of a broader wave of layoffs in the technology sector. Cisco announced an AI-driven restructuring affecting approximately 4,000 roles on the same day. Other companies including Block, WiseTech, Atlassian and Coinbase have cited AI productivity gains in earlier cuts this year.

fyi has recorded more than 103,000 technology sector roles eliminated globally so far in 2026. That figure approaches the 124,000 cuts recorded for all of 2025. LinkedIn's parent company Microsoft has reduced close to 7,000 employees this year, representing roughly 3 per cent of its workforce, and has offered voluntary retirement packages to about 7 per cent of its U.S. staff.

Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella visited Australia last month to discuss the company's $25 billion investment in local data centres and AI infrastructure. He acknowledged that AI adoption would lead to some job displacement while also creating new roles.

"I'm not saying that there won't be displacement, which is why investments we are making in skilling for areas that have a job market are critical," he said. " A former LinkedIn employee who was made redundant in Australia last year described the impact on those affected and those remaining.

She noted that the process of determining which roles are reduced can take weeks or months in a large global organisation. LinkedIn was recently excluded from a planned federal government scheme that would require certain large technology companies to compensate media outlets for the use of news content.