Dave Lewis tech layoffs have become a case study in how the post-pandemic correction at Big Tech companies is forcing workers to rethink not just where they work, but what kind of work remains viable over the next five years. Lewis was laid off twice in under three years, first by Amazon and then by Microsoft, before accepting a role at an AI startup focused on helping businesses be found by AI-powered consumer search.
A Decade at Google, Then the Churn Begins
Lewis joined Google as a digital media manager in 2012. He spent roughly a decade there before making a move that, in retrospect, placed him directly in the path of the industry’s most turbulent years. During the pandemic, he and his wife relocated from New York City to Montana, which complicated his position: some of his largest clients had been based just near Google’s New York City office. He wanted a new challenge, and said he was working on individual, complex problems rather than large industry ones, which was where he did his best work.
Amazon seemed the right fit. In July 2022, Lewis joined Amazon as a product lead, moving from an individual contributor role in sales into a broader product strategy position. Less than a year later, he was laid off as part of the company’s workforce reductions. He stayed in contact with former colleagues and managers, learned about a new team being formed, and in October 2023 rejoined Amazon as a technical product manager. ‘It was different getting hired back versus being hired new because I had some built-up goodwill, and people were familiar with my work,’ he said.
The return, however, carried a complication. Earlier in 2023, Amazon had announced that corporate employees would be required to work from the office three days a week. When Lewis rejoined, he was expected to make roughly monthly trips to Seattle, with the understanding that the arrangement would be revisited after his first year. Shortly before that one-year mark, the policy shifted to five days a week in office. His exception was not going to survive. He and his wife considered spending at least a year in Seattle while keeping their Montana home, but ultimately decided it was not the right fit for their family.
Dave Lewis Tech Layoffs: Microsoft and the Decision to Pivot
In January 2025, the same month Amazon’s five-day office mandate came into effect, Lewis left the company to take a remote partner sales executive role at Microsoft. The role required some travel but offered a new professional challenge and no full-time office requirement. Ten months later, his role at Microsoft was eliminated. For the second time in under three years, Lewis was looking for work.
He was in a position to be selective. Savings meant he did not have to accept the first offer that came along, and he had kept his professional network active. A former Google colleague had founded the AI startup Emberos, which helps businesses optimise their digital footprint for AI-powered consumer search. Lewis was already interested in how AI was changing the way people find information online. He accepted a full-time position as head of partnerships. There is no office requirement for the role, though he expects to make regular trips to the company’s office in Los Angeles.
After taking April off to welcome his son, Lewis began working full time in May.
What the Question He Kept Asking Himself Actually Means
Throughout his search, Lewis said he kept returning to a single question: ‘How do I make sure that I’m optimizing my career search for the next five years of what the industry’s going to be, not the five years that have brought me here?’ It is a question many in his position are asking. The broader labour market has seen slow hiring and low levels of redundancy, but tech has been different, with workers competing against a growing pool of laid-off professionals, recent graduates and currently employed workers seeking new opportunities.
Looming over all of it is AI, which is reshaping hiring decisions and the nature of roles themselves. Lewis, who is in his 30s, has landed somewhere at the intersection of those forces: a company whose entire value proposition is built on how AI is changing consumer behaviour online. His advice to others navigating redundancy is direct: ‘Think about roles that leverage your experience, challenge you to learn more about emerging technology, and offer long-term growth potential.’ The market, as he puts it, ‘is drastically changing every day.’