in the vicinity and san francisco has come up with many perfect day itineraries featuring the city's diverse neighborhoods. >> how you as a local can get in on the fun. but first, there haven't been many perfect days in the tech industry lately. some of the biggest heavyweights in silicon valley have just announced new layoffs. you're watching getting answers. i'm kristen sze. thanks for joining us. so reports today say mountain view based giant google announced it's cutting its users and products team responsible for addressing user complaints. this marks the fourth round of job cuts at google since september. and google is far from alone. joining us live now to discuss the latest trends and how they affect all of us here in the bay area, professor of management and entrepreneurship at santa clara university's levy school of business, tami mattson. professor mattson, thanks for joining us. >> hello. thanks for thanks for having me today.

>> big topic. can you give us an overview of recent layoffs in the tech industry, including which major companies have been affected and the scale? >> well, i can say that there's a long, long list of companies. i think we've had about 224,000 240,000 tech tech workers laid off in 2023. and about 90 k in 2022. and the layoffs have so that at least the layoffs this year have outpaced 2022. last year's reductions by quite a bit. >> right. some of the biggest companies lately, google, i think snap, amazon, zillow all announced new layoffs this week, right? >> yeah. and prior to that meta qualcomm, alphabet, oracle and the list continues to go on and then we're seeing repeat layoffs from some companies. right. who made a move last year and then are realizing, okay, we're we're either due to a strategic shift or some other event or causal mechanism have said, okay, we also need to do a bit more in in

in very targeted areas. now despite this, we do appear to be on a downward trend relative to january and february of 2023. um in january 2023, we had about, i think, 89,000 layoffs in one month. so a big question here, though, is we're on this downward trend up until december . will we experience that big spike again in january and so that's that that is a bit of a worry. >> before i ask you to look into that crystal ball, can you explain a little bit what the economic factors are that have been driving these layoffs? >> sure. i mean, i think part of it is the economic factors and also whether there are due to strategic strategic moves made by the organizations. right. so we have persistent uncertain economic conditions, inflation in particular, as well as major global events. and these have an impact on business and consumer spending, which can contribute to fears of a recession, even though there is a bit of in the press of downplaying of potential recession. that's still, i think, in the minds of boardrooms as well as executives . and during these inflationary time periods, as input costs go

up, companies that cannot absorb those costs would like to pass them on to consumers or to a business customers. but even those organizations can no longer absorb them, right? and so when that happens, then where do we go? we have to sort of figure out how do we how do we streamline our organization and start looking very closely at what types of areas can can we make those cuts in the risk is, is that oftentimes it will be in long range, active cities, right? so initiatives that are around innovation, innovating for the future for downstream that ends up being sacrificed in the short run to be able to become more efficient, to sort of become to strengthen the organization as a whole. and i'd say that what's really curious here, too, is that some of these organizations that have had major, major layoffs also are hiring back in some of those spaces. right? so whether it was sort of too aggressive and we're going to sort of hire a few people back or whether they've sort of made some type of change in the type of talent that they need. right and of course, we

think about talent. these days. we oftentimes think about i talent. and we did a recent survey going to say, right, which are the sectors that are most vulnerable and seeing cuts and which are the ones that are actually growing right. i think that there's you know, we're seeing growth in a lot of areas. right? surprisingly. and think there is this tendency to think that ai or gen ai in particular is a substitute for many, many different roles. but in fact it's more of a complementary capability to knowledge worker roles. and in the tech space, it's really largely about knowledge workers, right? so from that standpoint, it's unlikely to create sort of, you know, these jobs that are being laid off now are not necessarily going to be automatically replaced by by technology. so we what what is the next strategic agenda for these firms? and i think for some companies, all of these companies are experiencing it differently. right? so some companies might be healthy. they might have good capabilities and

weathering a downturn. they're sort of they have on their strategic agendas, carefully managing their workforce. and the volume of that workforce and identifying times to reduce that workforce prior to a performance decline. in other cases, companies haven't weathered that storm. they're not prepared for it, and they have to sort of make these really drastic cuts and it's harmful to their organizations as well. right? so in what i've heard from from a lot of executives i've spoken to lately is that in many ways, some of the cuts are sort of not necessarily cutting roles, but they're cutting a job. right so that that role, that that person played, that task just gets distributed among other folks on top of their other role that they had before. and we all know that is not a healthy way. it's not sort of a long term way to run run an organization. >> i was just going to say, that's got to be bad for morale, right? how does a company kind of at the same time do this, if streamline, if you will, but also try to keep up employee morale right.

>> once that rumor starts within the organization about it's on the horizon, then it starts to really consume the energy of the employees, right? so in some ways, companies are much better off if they can step back and be very clear about what's the purpose, what's the reason for this particular layoff and communicate that very effectively to the existing employee base to shut down that rumor mill and to sort of calm the nerves of the employee group and i think, you know, that part of the communication is critical to sort of for the future of the organization because talent also can start to leave to walk out. that's not laid off. right? so there you know as if a company starts to downsize too much, there is a question about what's our viability as an organization and where are we going? what what's our what are we sacrificing in the future. right. so short termism, kind of taking, taking, taking a role or driving the company right now might be a problem for the future, even if our viewers are not necessarily in the tech industry. >> how does this impact them being that tech is such a big

driver of all economic activity in the bay area, how does that spill over? >> i think it spills over in a variety of different ways right? so that if we if we think about companies reducing services in a particular area or or even in instances where they're laying off, they're increasing the prices for services or products. and so for everyday consumern under an inflationary period where everything is going up, it's a problem. it's a big problem, right? so we might think about what else are we going to cut in our sort of discretionary spending and then for many, it's not even that you don't have the option, right? you don't even have discretionary spending right here in the valley because of the cost of living and whatnot. so lots of pressures on families, lots of pressures on on businesses and i don't think this is going to let up any time soon. >> uh oh. i was just going to ask you what is the future hold we have about 20s, but how long are we going to be in this contraction period? do you think? >> well, i don't have a precise

answer for that, but i think there is still a lot of unrest going on in our macro environment, not only. right. so economic conditions, but in that uncertainty, we have an election coming up next year. so there's going to be sort of a lot of a lot of activity around that. so it'll be interesting to see. my hope is that we don't see this spike in january again of layoffs and that we continue to sort of get to a steady state point and see what happens. >> we'll buckle our seat belts. tammie mattson, thank you so much. really appreciate you coming on and sharing your expertise. >> thank you so much. >> we'll be right back with a look ahead to apec. how san francisco is addressing one of its most troubling problems homelessness. as the conference prepares to kick

pet flag was raised today at san francisco's city hall. mayor london breed officially raised it to kick off the global summit. the asia pacific economic cooperation forum, or apec, begins tomorrow. and you can expect quite an impact on san francisco in several different ways. if you're in the city, there will be unprecedented security, including street closures and transit changes. the main security zones are around moscone center and the fairmont hotel, where a lot of the leaders might be staying. apec runs through november 17th, but many streets won't reopen until monday, november 20th. and, you know, there will be protests as well. so the city is putting its best foot forward in an effort to show off all of san francisco. that includes clearing out some hotspots for homeless tent camps. joining us live now to discuss what's been done and what's still being done to spruce up san francisco ahead

of the conference is rachel gordon. she's the director of policy and communications for the san francisco public works department. rachel, it's been a while, but very nice to see you. >> nice seeing you, kristen. >> so i know anecdotally many people are saying, wow, downtown city hall, waterfront areas, market looking great. do you agree with that? >> i think we have put our best foot forward and you'll see a lot more of that over the next week. and hopefully going forward well beyond apec, can you talk about what's been done so far? so we've been doing not just public works, but really multiple. all city departments have been working very hard to beautify san francisco, try to revitalize all the neighborhoods and downtown. so some of the projects that public works has been involved in include putting in some new decorative crosswalks. there's one in chinatown called clouds on stockton, which has these whimsical clouds that are in the in the crosswalk where people are going. it looks wonderful. in north beach at stockton, at stockton and union streets,

we've put in the colors of the italian flag just last week we were over in japantown and we had painted a pedestrian bridge that's been around since the redevelopment days. a wonderful vermil red, which is indicative of the torii gates in japan. and we had a wonderful celebration for that. and you'll see a lot more landscape plants going in. i was walking downtown the other day and saw some new hanging flower baskets. it's really trying to beautify the city and show really who we are and what we can be as a as a wonderful world class san francisco. >> this planning must have started a while back right? it's not something you do just like that. >> no. this started months. many many months ago because it does involve coordination. so it's not just san francisco. agencies are involved, but it really is a very driven by the federal government, particularly around security. not only do we have president biden coming to town, vice president kamala harris coming to town, but almost two dozen other leaders of the countries in in the in asia and

going all the way down through the americas, it's a big deal for san francisco. we really don't think we've had a event of this magnitude since the un charter was signed in the 1940s. so this is something that's going to keep and put san francisco on the world stage over the next week. we are ready for it. we're excited for it. we really hope to tell the story of san francisco. >> yeah, well, you know, part of it is also just dealing with some of the historic homeless encampments. according to the chronicle article today, a public works email list is seven intersections in the tenderloin and south of market. what did you do there? >> so we do what we've always done with encampment outs in san francisco, and that's that we tried to lead with outreach. we always will lead with outreach. in fact, we're not just clearing encampment. we provide services to people. we ask people and request that they go into shelter. really nobody should be living on the streets of san francisco. so if there is an alternative, it's not healthy or

safe for them and it's not great for the neighborhoods. if you want to get through. so a number of these encampments that were mentioned started to spill across the sidewalk into the curb lanes. really not making it safe, especially when we have tens of thousands of people coming to san francisco. but san francisco, again, has been leading with services. no one is being pushed off the streets unless they've been offered shelter. >> so how does that work? right because what if somebody says no , you still have that federal injunction in place that says you can't force people. right. it's got to be voluntary unless you have enough units, beds. and we probably still don't have that because that doesn't happen in a day. so uh, is all of this voluntary? >> yeah. so there are different grades of it. if a street or a sidewalk is being completely blocked by an encampment, we do have the ability to move people to another location. if there's not a shelter bed available. so sometimes that's done. we want to get in there as public works crews to go in and clean. sometimes we know that encampments are not sanitary, that there could be human waste

there. there could be food, garbage there. so we really want to clean that up, not just for the people who live in there, but it's very important for that as well. but also for the people in the surrounding neighborhoods. so, again, no one is being pushed out if there's nowhere to go. but we may ask people to get up and move so we can get in there to clean it and also to make sure that there is a clear path of travel. but people have been offered shelter. san francisco has opened more shelter beds in fact, mayor breed just announced today that the winter shelter program is opening. and that's that's standard for this time of year. we're expecting big rainstorms coming next year. we want to make sure that people have an opportunity to get inside and out of the inclement weather. >> i've seen some social posts saying that out. new areas are seeing tents pop up. i've seen some talking about venice or the richmond or sunset areas that previously didn't have any. so is this just a matter of people moving over? and how do you deal with some of the comments from the residents in those areas?

>> yeah, so sometimes it's true that people do pick up and move. if people have been blocking a sidewalk and we have to get in to clean, then they aren't going to go into a shelter. then they may move to other areas. this is not a new phenomenon for san francisco, that homeless encampments and people in just in single tents or a couple of tents may move to other areas. we're keeping a close eye on that in san francisco. really our goal is the city is to get people into shelter and into services. there's no big push to get people out of one area and into another area. that's not the way we do business in san francisco. so we want to make sure that people have opportunities to go down the street safely, enjoy the city, not just if you're coming from another country or another state, but also if you're a resident or business here. and also to be very mindful of the people who are living on the streets that they have very real needs to they need shelter, they need services. we have outreach teams going out there every single day, not just for apek, but really for years going into apec with a big emphasis over

the last year with more opportunities, more money, more programs to try to get people into appropriate services. in san francisco. >> i see. so the money that accompanied apec really gave you an opportunity to make a push on a lot of the things you've been wanting to do in the city. right? because i do hear a lot of people saying, wow, this is amazing. will it stay like this after apex? so what's your answer to that? >> yeah, i think the really exciting thing about apex is it did give us an opportunity with some money. the state of california gave some money for beautification projects and something like the decorative crosswalks that i mentioned before in north beach and chinatown down the bridge in japantown. that's something that the community has been wanting for a long time. in fact, we have a backlog of cases of requests from people who want to have these beautification projects go forward. apex gave us a little push to do it, but it's not something that we're going to rip out as soon as apex goes away. these are projects that are going to benefit san francisco for at least another generation. we hope to keep the momentum going. even things like planting, we put on a lot of new

landscaping in front of yerba buena gardens on mission street around third street. people have been wanting for that. so we could put wanting that for a long time. so we have an opportunity to do that with apec, you know, this again is a big deal for san francisco. we're on the global stage and this is something that if you have a governor newsom actually mentioned this yesterday, i thought it was very appropriate. you have a party at your house. you want to make sure that the beds are made and the rugs are vacuumed and the toys are put away. we're doing the same thing and want to just say one of the reasons we're doing it, if people might complain, well, you're just doing this for apec. we have to remember, however, that tourism and convention business really is the economic blood of san francisco in many ways, right? we really do. we really rely on on that sector. if we have more people come, if they enjoy san francisco with us, we just had it with dreamforce. we got very high marks as a city. in fact, dreamforce that are coming back next year. but if we have successful conventions like this, if we can turn the

narrative that has been trickling through, you know, social media over time, that means more conventions come. that means more business for restaurants, more business for hotels, sales, more jobs for people working in those industries. that means more revenue for tax dollars, and that equates to more money for street cleaning, more money for police patrols, more money for expanded library hours, rec centers. you can go down that list. so it really is important for us in san francisco, rachel, thank you so very much. >> i'm going to let you go so you can get ready for what's the super bowl to you guys in the department of public works. appreciate your time. >> thank you for having me. >> speaking of perfect days in san francisco, that's exactly what the city has come up with for apec visitors. we'll talk about that

it's good when you eat with the

fried egg and garlic rice. >> yummy. this video is promoting what the south of market area has to offer. it's one of several itinerary for perfect days that visitors can find at sf dot gov. right now it's the city's efforts to guide guests through some wonderful itineraries in each of san francisco's neighborhoods. joining us live now to tell us more about perfect san francisco days is katie tang, executive director for san francisco's office of small business. thank you, katie, for joining us. >> hello. thanks for having me. >> can you tell me about the perfect sf days project? right? how did it get started? was it just for apec? so it certainly was sparked by epec, but we see this as a wonderful little curation of activities that people can explore in different commercial corridors throughout the city well beyond apec. >> and so we were grateful for this opportunity to launch this initiative and really hope that again, beyond apec, that visitors and even locals will find this to be a really

wonderful resource where all these experiences are curated by locals in the community, in the know, with wonderful businesses and experiences. >> so if you go to sfgate gov, right, look for perfect days like i saw you had many itineraries for many of the cities neighborhoods tell us, given an example, if we click on japantown right, what will it show us? will it take us to certain business cases? are there special offers? >> yes, that's right. so if you click on each neighborhood, you will find mostly a lot of brick and mortar businesses that you can go and explore and support. but also it might guide you to say a walking tour and you can participate in special walking tours where you can contact someone to participate in that. so the url for that is sf.gov/explore or sf and it is part of our shops in sf campaign , which has a lot of information on about ways to support our local small businesses and

experience. san francisco. let's just encourage these neighborhoods. >> look, we're scrolling through. you have castro bay view, moscone center so much. can we click on one of these? oh, yeah, we can choose one. all right. chinatown so walk us through what kind of legacy businesses are and what makes a business a legacy business. >> so legacy businesses are those that have been in san francisco for at least 30 years. so that's three decades or more. and so a lot of these are institutions and clearly they have survived and thrived for so long because they offer something really special and wonderful for the community. so as you could see here, scrolling through chinatown, you could see wonderful ellie and eva company, for example, all with classical chinese instrument kits. we've got, you know, wonderful gift shops and restaurants and places like the chinese historical society of america. so yeah, a lot of wonderful places that people can visit and we also,

you know, just again, this is for visitors and locals alike. and i love personally finding and discoverg new corridors and new businesses that i never even knew about having grown up in san francisco. >> i think it's neat because it's getting people out of some of the tourist areas like the embarcadero, right? or like downtown and really getting them into the neighborhoods is. >> that's right. i mean, you think about whenever you're planning a trip somewhere for even for yourself and you're trying to look up what you want to do. a lot of times you get a lot of, you know, generic information. but these are such well curated experience from people deeply in the community. so that's what we love about this. and we hope people will utilize this tool. again. it's sf.gov/explore or sf by locals for both tourists and locals. >> so fantastic. we're always looking for kind of staycation ideas as i think you can start there. >> there you go. yes, all right. >> katie tang, thank you so very

much for talking about perfect san francisco days. really appreciate it. good job. >> thank you very much. >> we'll take a short break a from the state that's already helped millions of people like you get and pay for health insurance. with financial health to lower the cost of health coverage, you could get a quality health plan for less than $10 a month. every plan covers preventive care, doctor visits, emergency care, and more. if you have questions, we're here to help every step of the way.

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experts from around the bay area . world news tonight with david muir is next. i'll see you back here at four and all next week tonight, new israeli air strikes trigger mass evacuations in gaza. hospitals caught in the cross fire. palestinian health officials accuse israel of hitting hospitals in gaza city, including the city's large