Former Facebook recruiters revealed that multiple talents have turned down job posts offered by the tech giant that once was a top company to work for. The struggle with new hires started shortly after the Cambridge Analytica scandal was publicized.
In interviews with CNBC, former recruiters said Facebook saw a significant decline in job acceptance rates since March 2018 when Cambridge Analytica accessed the private information of millions of network users.
The social media behemoth is known for recruiting thousands of new employees annually and difficulties in getting new hires to join the workforce are just part of the overall struggle that came with the company's data privacy issues.
The higher cost of living in the Bay Area also contributed to the difficulties that Facebook has been faced with over the last few months. Furthermore, some potential hires have set their eyes on other Facebook rivals such as Lyft, Slack, and startups.
Software engineer hires dropped to almost 50 percent as of early 2019 while fresh graduate hires only averaged between 35 percent to 55 percent as of December. The top schools that declined Facebook jobs are Ivy League universities and Carnegie Mellon University.
For the school year 2017-2018, Facebook averaged 85 percent in securing new hires that just graduated from Stanford and other top American universities. The drop in job offer acceptance rates has been dismissed by company spokesperson Anthony Harrison.
According to the outlet, Harrison said "these numbers are totally wrong," referring to the revelations from former recruiters who left the firm over the last few months.
Harrison argued that Facebook has been ranked by LinkedIn and other ranking agencies as one of the top 10 best companies to work with. "Our annual intern survey showed exceptionally strong sentiment and intent to return and we continue to see strong acceptance rates across University Recruiting," Harrison said.
Meanwhile, the company secured the service of former compliance veterans from Coinbase. Multiple outlets confirmed that the new blockchain experts, Mikheil Moucharrafie and Jeff Cartwright, are veterans in the segment.
There have been rumors pointing to Facebook pursuing initiatives in the blockchain sector. The company has yet to confirm analyst speculation about a behemoth cryptocurrency project reportedly called Libra.
The U.S. Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs has reportedly questioned the firm's blockchain efforts. CEO Mark Zuckerberg was reportedly asked how his company would address privacy concerns if Libra turns out to be real or a separate crypto payment system is launched in the near future.
Facebook's new blockchain experts have yet to confirm if they are working on the company's crypto team or not.
