People are hired to deliver what's on product and/or engineering roadmaps. If the roadmaps are less ambitious, it becomes pretty easy to justify headcount reduc

People are hired to deliver what's on product and/or engineering roadmaps. If the roadmaps are less ambitious, it becomes pretty easy to justify headcount reductions. It's also less labor intensive to focus on a few core areas, making smaller incremental improvements than doing that PLUS launching big ambitious greenfield projects. Also, remember how people used to say "Startup X is a bad idea because <established tech company> could just clone you in 6 months"? Well, those ideas are now back on the menu for entrepreneurs because bigger tech firms are now running too lean for quixotic defensive plays like that.