The onset of the new year has been met with news of additional layoffs, after about of them last year. More may be on the way, especially for remote workers and middle managers, Bloomberg reported.

Despite reported highs in job openings, stocks and consumer confidence, job cuts have been announced by some of the country’s largest and most recognizable employers: Alphabet, Amazon, Citigroup, Ebay, Macy’s, Microsoft, Shell, Sports Illustrated, UPS and Wayfair.

Two potential targets for companies looking to slim down are remote workers and middle managers, experts told Bloomberg.

“Companies often target middle management for cuts. They try to streamline,” said Daniel Zhao, lead economist at Glassdoor. “Middle managers are often squeezed from both sides at a time like this. They’re often cut, but they’re also often responsible for implementing these measures to get more efficient.”

“Being remote makes it easier to let you go,” said Ariel Schur, chief executive officer of ABS Staffing Solutions in New York. “You don’t have that day-to-day interaction. It’s easier on a human level to let go of someone. It’s easier to utilize that as a rationale for layoffs.”

Firms contemplating layoffs need affirmative answers to two questions, said Gartner Managing Vice President George Penn: Is the employee making money for the firm now? And, will the employee make money for the firm in the future?

Daniel Keum, associate professor of management at Columbia Business School, advised anxious employees to “show up [and] show commitment.”

“The era of remote work is in decline,’ he said. “If the work can be done remotely, it can be moved abroad.”

Monique Valcour, an executive coach, recommended that employees work to build solid relationships with management, avoid spreading themselves too thin, make the commitments they already have count and embrace some of the change that may be coming their way.

Noting that many firms, particularly in tech companies, overhired during the pandemic, Lauren Goodwin, chief market strategist at New York Life Investments, said that the layoffs she has seen have been “more about normalizing” than a “profit-driven set of layoffs.”

Some layoffs appear connected to the current business climate in which interest rates are high but widely expected to fall at some point later this year, according to Bloomberg.

“Firms are also repositioning and reorienting and reorganizing for growth,” said Keum.