Key Points
- Canva is restructuring its operations in a move affecting 1,271 employees, or nearly one-quarter of its global workforce.
- The changes include job eliminations, employee relocations, organizational consolidation and expanded in-office requirements.
- Co-Founder and CEO Melanie Perkins said the restructuring follows the company’s first significant slowdown in growth in a decade.
Graphic design technology company Canva is restructuring its global workforce by laying off some employees and requiring others to return to offices, the company said this week.
In a memo sent by Canva co-Founder and CEO Melanie Perkins, the company said nearly one-quarter of its employee headcount will be affected by the change. Some workers will be laid off as a result of the restructuring, which will see consolidation across some of its business units.
Employees who are shown the door will be offered severance packages and post-employment benefits, including job placement assistance, Perkins said.
“This has been our hardest year yet, and as we shared earlier this year, our growth has slowed for the first time in a decade,” Perkins wrote, noting that the layoffs and restructuring was the byproduct of “the most-difficult period in Canva’s 13-year history.”
The company is combining its Product, Growth and Platform divisions into a single organization, reducing management layers and consolidating responsibilities previously distributed among specialized teams. Canva also plans to centralize more product development operations in Sydney, Australia, while increasing in-person collaboration across its global workforce.
Starting next year, most employees working under hybrid arrangements will be expected to spend approximately two to three days per week in an office, depending on local requirements.
Perkins said the organizational changes are intended to simplify decision-making and allow smaller teams to take greater responsibility for developing and improving Canva’s products. Executives did not say how many of the nearly-1,300 affected workers will be given pink slips; those who leave will be able to keep their company-issued MacBook computers, Perkins said.
Canva is perhaps best known for its online image creation and editing suite, but the company made aggressive moves to acquire other businesses following the global coronavirus health pandemic rooted in a quick, scale-up strategy.
Some of the companies Canva acquired in recent years include Serif, the distributor of Photoshop and Designer-like software under the Affinity brand; stock image libraries Pexels and Pixabay; chart maker Flourish and a number of platforms and products rooted in artificial intelligence technology like MagicBrief, Zeetings, MangoAI, Simtheory and Ortto.
Perkins said Canva will continue investing in its products and global operations while reorganizing its workforce to accommodate changing customer expectations and emerging technologies. The company plans to hold an all-staff meeting on November 11 to discuss its long-term plan forward.
