Open roles unfulfilled
"We're also told that the number of open roles in Cisco far outnumbers the layoffs, so with good fortune, the company will be able to redeploy affected staff, although that will depend on how willing recently discarded staff will be to stay, and how willing managers are to continue taking them on. Payoffs are, by some accounts, pretty good for those leaving, and recruiters for the competition are no-doubt hovering for the best pickings."
I suspect most of these open roles will be unfulfilled as recently layed off staff usually have some reluctance to return to that employer, especially if there are other opportunities. This goes double for the most valuable employees, who will have a lot of choice. A much smarter move would have been to encourage the best (those which the employer would like to retain) to apply for other positions and laying off the remainder in complete teams after cherry picking.