He targeted to lay off 1,000 employees and eliminate hundreds of open roles before the new CEO’s job starts

The goal is to cut about 1,000 jobs at the company and eliminate 800 open positions in an effort to speed up business decision-making and drive growth under its policy. New CEO Michael Fidelke.

Fidelky, who will Brian Cornell succeeds as CEO In February, the focus was on ways to accelerate the way the company’s teams work, transforming the company into a leaner, faster organization to drive innovation. This includes removing layers of management.

About 80% of the roles that will be eliminated are located in the United States, with the majority concentrated in the Minneapolis area, where the company is headquartered, and in leadership positions. Target said those in leadership positions were three times more likely to be laid off than other employees.

The divestitures will represent 8% of the company’s global headquarters team.

“In order to better serve our guests, we prioritize the need to act faster and reduce complexity created over time. This is especially important against the backdrop of a rapidly changing business landscape,” Fedelke said, adding that the announcement “is an important step towards our key priorities: strengthening our retail leadership in terms of style and design, enhancing the guest experience and expanding how we use technology to fuel the next chapter of growth.”

Target said affected employees will receive benefits and pay through the beginning of January, in addition to any severance pay they were offered.

Fiddelke said in a memo to employees Thursday that since the company launched its Enterprise Acceleration Office in May, it has been moving forward with a mission to “move faster and simplify how we work to drive the next chapter of growth for Target.”

As the executive overseeing the initiative since its launch, Fedelke has been looking for ways to improve cross-functional collaboration and advance key priorities. This includes streamlining company-wide processes and leveraging technology and data in new ways to empower teams and accelerate performance from launch.

“The truth is that the complexity we have created over time is holding us back. Having too many layers and overlapping work has slowed decisions, making it difficult to bring ideas to life,” Fedelke said in the memo to employees.

All members of the U.S. headquarters team will be asked to work from home next week, but Target in India and its other global teams will follow their own in-office routines, Fedelke said.

Fiddelke, who has been with Target for more than two decades, said that while the decision to make these cuts was a difficult one, they will aim to “set the course for our company to become stronger, faster and better positioned to serve guests and communities for many years to come.”

In Fiddelke’s current role as Chief Operating Officer at Target, he has overseen efforts that have enabled tremendous growth across the business, including investments to build and expand the company’s stores, supply chain, digital capabilities and team. He also led the organization’s efforts to achieve more than $2 billion in efficiencies.

He now faces the new challenge of turning around a retailer that has been struggling with declining store traffic and profit pressures, partly due to tariffs.

In its most recent fiscal quarter, the company reported sales of $25.2 billion, down 0.9% from the same period last year. The company blamed the decline on shoppers backing away from merchandise, though that was partially offset by strong non-merchandise sales, such as services.

Sales at stores open at least a year fell 1.9%, with in-store sales down more than 3%. However, online sales grew by just over 4%. Overall, operating income for the quarter was $1.3 billion, down about 19.4% from the same period last year.