Despite assurances to the contrary by Yahoo! chief Carol Bartz last autumn that it was “done” with job cuts, the search giant has done it again – announced another swathe of redundancies.

Since 2008, Yahoo! has made three rounds of cuts, but that was apparently not enough. The firm has cut a slice from its diminishing search team as part of a restructuring move, although numbers have not been divulged.

In a statement that epitomises the long-windedness, wooliness and piss-poor spin of management speak, Yahoo, said: “Yahoo! remains focused on innovating the overall search experience over the long-term, and the Yahoo! Search group is hard at work on some new experiences that we believe will convert Yahoo! users to Yahoo! searchers…” Imagine this as the corporate statement equivalent of a drum roll.

However, the blah does eventually cut to the chase (kind of): “To accomplish our new product objectives, we have decided that we need a different combination of talent and are making changes within the search group in order to more deeply invest in other areas of the group.”

Which is a thinly-veiled way of saying “we’re axing a load of people”. It’s not that I have a problem with businesses making redundancies per se, it’s just this apparent belief that by speaking in this obtuse manner, Yahoo! can soften the blow. It’s smoke and mirrors, but minus the illusion.

Anyway, TechCrunch speculates, rightly, that it’s likely that the latest job cuts are the result of a deal Yahoo! forged last year with Microsoft that saw it outsource its Bing search engine.

Also, it’s no secret that Bartz is driving areas of Yahoo!’s business other than search (who searches with Yahoo!? No one I know). An example, that we reported on, was that group has agreed to pay $100m for the US-based Associated Content, which produces cheap content (text, pictures and video), with plans to expand it globally.

But it is depressing that after Yahoo!’s previous round of layoffs last spring – when it cut 5% or around 700 staff – Bartz’s assurances weren’t worth the press release they were printed on.