Getting laid off should not be a red flag on a resume, but in the tech industry, it often is. A 10-year Amazon veteran, laid off in January 2026, has taken to LinkedIn to express her frustration with interviewers who assume a layoff implies poor performance. She claimed that her role, along with several others in her organisation, was offshored to India to help fund Amazon's $200 billion investment in data centres and AI innovation.
“I’m a little baffled by how often I get asked in interviews why I was laid off. The answer I usually give is the one that was given to me in my off-boarding meeting: My job was offshored to India, along with all the others in my organization, all the way up to the program managers. I sometimes get looks of skepticism, but what more can I say? Amazon wanted to invest $200B in data centers and AI innovation, so they had to cut costs. Is it rude to tell interviewers to Google it?” the woman claimed.
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She added, “I think what a lot of them are getting at is that they don’t understand the difference between reduction-in-force and fired-for-cause. In the past few years, Microsoft, Google, Meta, Amazon, and hundreds of other companies have collectively cut hundreds of thousands of jobs. These were financial decisions made at the executive level, affecting people who had been doing their jobs well.”
{{/usCountry}}She added, “I think what a lot of them are getting at is that they don’t understand the difference between reduction-in-force and fired-for-cause. In the past few years, Microsoft, Google, Meta, Amazon, and hundreds of other companies have collectively cut hundreds of thousands of jobs. These were financial decisions made at the executive level, affecting people who had been doing their jobs well.”
{{/usCountry}}In the following lines, the former Amazon employee described layoffs as a “business tool.” She claimed, “They happen to strong performers, long-term employees, and people who were well-regarded on their teams, and they also happen to people who were hired 18 months ago when growth projections looked different than they do today. Getting fired is a sticky legal mess that leaves you without a professional reference.”
She explained, “The assumption that layoff = red flag also has an uncomfortable flip side: It implies that the people who *weren’t* laid off are safer bets, when in reality their retention was a matter of tenure, team structure, timing, and luck. (Exactly the same determining factors for those who got cut.).”
In the LinkedIn post, she continued by saying that HR should call references and previous employers if they are really interested in hiring an employee.
“If a company is actually interested in hiring you, they can call your previous employer’s HR department an verify whether or not you’re eligible for rehire. In an interview, the time is better spent focusing on what you did at that company, how you did it, and what you could bring to your next role.”
Her LinkedIn profile suggests she joined Amazon in 2015 and worked at the organisation in different roles over the years. She was allegedly affected y Amazon mass layoff in January 2026.