Verizon CEO reveals mistakes that led to over 13,000 layoffs | Official Website of Louis Velazquez, entrepreneur, finance guy and tech innovator

In recent weeks, Verizon has been turning heads with drastic changes that signal the company is heading in a new direction amid recent struggles.

The phone carrier first raised eyebrows when it replaced then-CEO Hans Vestberg on Oct. 6 with Dan Schulman, the former CEO of PayPal. The shakeup in leadership occurred during a period when Verizon had been rapidly losing customers over the past few months, following the implementation of price hikes and the removal of discounts.

Verizon even revealed in its third-quarter earnings report for 2025 that it lost 7,000 postpaid phone customers during the quarter, which led to the company’s churn rate reaching 0.91%.

During an earnings call in October, Schulman admonished Verizon for “clearly falling short” of its potential, flagging that price increases, friction in the customer experience, negative value perception, and heightened competition in the telecom industry are causing customer losses.

“We are not delivering the shareholder returns our investors expect,” said Schulman. “Despite investing significantly in network leadership, we have not been able to translate that into winning in the market.”

Schulman emphasized that Verizon needs to “aggressively transform” its culture and financial profile by being more “customer-centric and executing with financial discipline with a focus on shareholder value.”

Shortly after his comments, Verizon laid off over 13,000 employees last month to “simplify” its operations.

“It’s important that we direct our energy and resources to set Verizon on a path to success,” wrote Schulman in a memo sent to employees last month. “The actions we’re taking are designed to make us faster and more focused, positioning our company to deliver for our customers while continuing to capture new growth opportunities.”

Verizon is suffering from increased customer losses.

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Verizon CEO reveals what went wrong before layoff announcement

Now, Schulman is doubling down on his recent decision to shrink the company’s workforce. In an internal all-hands meeting with employees on Dec. 5, Shulman once again highlighted that the company is falling behind its competitors after “irritating” customers, according to a recent report from Barron’s.

“We’ve lost like 500 to 700 basis points of market share in the last five years,” said Schulman. “And by the way, that puts pressure on a lot of things. It puts pressure on our revenue. It means we have to compete harder. We start raising rates and when we start raising rates, you start irritating customers big time. They start churning. Like our churn is up like 20, 25 basis points since we started raising rates.”

He also said that Verizon’s customer satisfaction scores “are worse than our competitors,” which is partially due to the company not offering employees the “financial flexibility” to get things done.

“A lot of it is self-inflicted wounds. A lot of it,” said Schulman during the meeting.

Amid increased competition, Verizon’s consumer satisfaction score for postpaid phone plans is lower than the average for mobile network operators, according to a recent survey from J.D. Power.

Phone carrier consumer satisfaction rates for postpaid plans:

The average consumer satisfaction score for postpaid plans under mobile network operators is 593 (on a 1,000-point scale)
T-Mobile ranks the highest with a satisfaction score of 636.
Verizon takes second place with a 583 score.
AT&T falls behind Verizon with a satisfaction score of 573. Source: J.D. Power

“The findings show that value is the most important driver of the overall experience, followed closely by service quality,” said Carl Lepper, senior director of technology, media and telecom at J.D. Power, in a press release.

“These two dimensions are central to our new model — and for good reason,” said Lepper. “As the market expands with a wide variety of brands designed to meet diverse customer needs, expectations are rising — not just for strong network performance, but also for service plans that reflect individual preferences.”

More Telecom News:

During the call, Schulman said that the mass layoffs were “inevitable because if we don’t have enough money to put back into our value proposition to customers, we are going to continue to shrink.”

He said that making only minor cuts would have eventually led to a larger one in the future.

His statements come after he said in a call with employees in October, which was reviewed by Barron’s, that “a lot of the friction” at Verizon occurs because the company’s offers are “so complex.”

“We have so many different promotions out there,” said Schulman.

Verizon’s layoffs reflect a growing workplace trend

The move from Verizon follows in the footsteps of its tech industry peers. According to recent data from Layoffs.fyi, 239 tech companies have conducted layoffs this year, resulting in over 120,000 tech employees losing their jobs.

In November, U.S. job cuts across all industries skyrocketed, causing layoffs for the entire year to surpass 1.1 million, according to recent data from Challenger, Gray, & Christmas.

November 2025 U.S. job cut data:

U.S. employers announced 71,321 job cuts in November, up 24% from the 57,727 job cuts announced during the same month in 2024.
November’s total job cuts are the highest for the month since 2022, when 76,835 job cuts were announced.
The telecommunications industry had the most job cuts in November than any other industry, announcing 15,139, primarily due to Verizon. This is the highest monthly total since April 2020, when 16,552 layoffs were announced in the sector.
So far this year, the telecom industry has announced 38,035 layoffs, a 268% increase from the 10,331 announced during the same period last year. Source: Challenger, Gray, & Christmas

“Layoff plans fell last month, certainly a positive sign. That said, job cuts in November have risen above 70,000 only twice since 2008: in 2022 and in 2008,” said Andy Challenger, chief revenue officer for Challenger, Gray, & Christmas, in the report.

“It was the trend to announce layoff plans toward the end of the year, to align with most companies’ fiscal year-ends. It became unpopular after the Great Recession especially, and best practice dictated layoff plans would occur at times other than the holidays,” said Challenger.