“We Value Our People,” Says Microsoft While Converting 60,000 Employees Into CapEx for Data Centers

REDMOND, WA — Microsoft ($MSFT) reaffirmed that employees are its greatest asset Tuesday before explaining how much easier that asset would be to depreciate if it were a building full of servers.

The company’s voluntary buyout offer to 60,000 employees includes severance, career counseling, and the satisfaction of knowing their discontinued dental coverage will help Copilot free up space by removing references to files that no longer exist.

“We value our people,” said workforce transformation director Britta Waddell. “Specifically, we’ve established what they’re worth in transformers, concrete, and backup diesel.”

Under the plan, departing staff will be moved from the company’s grandiloquent “Our People, Our Future” presentation into a quieter spreadsheet labeled “Capacity Unlocked.”

HR managers have instructed employees who accept the offer to describe their transition as a "promotion" from operating expense to capital expenditure... Employees with more than twenty years of institutional knowledge qualify to fund a particularly reliable section of Cat 6 and fiber optic cable.