Thread regarding IBM layoffs

The answer is IT WAS A GREAT PLACE TO WORK! I didn't know much about IBM when I was hired as a programmer in 1968, but my dad said I was set for life. The S/360 was revolutionary, and we were riding the wave. Good pay and benefits, generous vacation, country clubs, holiday parties, etc. They even gave me engraved silver spoons when my kids were born! And I had enough savings to put them through college without having to borrow. No one (that I know) was ever fired from IBM, and we were proud to work there! Of course things went downhill in the 80's and I took the buyout in 1992. I now have a new career, but I receive a monthly pension check under the old plan. I sympathize with current workers having to endure the turmoil, but once again, IT ONCE WAS A GREAT PLACE TO WORK. Read my story at https://watchingibm.com/retiree-voices/

@vfr good memories! A lot of the benefits cost money and I can see why they were phased out. But the idea that an exec actually cared about an employee's welfare cost nothing, and bought a lot of respect and loyalty. Our execs in the 80's wanted to know us and make sure we were doing well. Today's execs hate their employees and wish tens of thousands would just go away.

IBM has changed along with the United States, to become a dog eat dog environment where loyalty is a joke and there are a lot of rich and poor with a shrinking middle class.
C and C-1,2 3, level employees make way more than the average worker.

I grew up near Poughkeepsie, NY. in the 70s and 80s. Most all the dads worked for IBM.
IBM had a country club for employees with a nice pool, etc. Christmas parties and company picnics were normal.
If you wanted to climb the corporate ladder you had to move around. (IBM = I've been moved).
However, most of the dads I knew did not move and all of us kids grew up in the same homes.
No one was rich - everyone was basically middle class, upper middle class as their parents aged into their 50s.

It was that great a company to work for. IBM treated employees incredibly well, and employees responded with unparalleled loyalty. We didn't care about EPS or market share or any of that. In our minds it was a simple agreement - the best professionals doing their best work for a company that showed its appreciation for our effort in big ways and small. The stories you hear about people giving their lives to the company are true, because we thought IBM had earned it in the way they treated us. Excellent salary, full employment, plenty of benefits, and a real sense of family. IBM was a lifestyle and people respected you just because you were an IBMer. I was already an experienced ex-manager when it all started to come apart in the early 90s. IBM walked away from its part of the agreement and we were all stunned. It took years for us to accept that treachery, and once we did, we had no loyalty left for the people who had swindled us.

You can easily see the math here. IBM is going to offshore everything it can to lower their labor costs. Let’s play the “what if” game If GBS and GTS (on shore) are downsized to 5% of the workforce (say 10k worth of enterprise Folks needed for engagements NA). Add in the plants 2500 folks each (POK, Austin, RST, and storage) for a total of 10k (max), add in 5k overhead for HQ and their AA’s, then add 10k for Redhat and cognitive and you are at 35k headcount in NA. That’s where IBM is aiming. Everything else in this covid world goes off shore YEP it’s not pretty, but it’s where IBM is heading along with every other high tech company.

As a multigenerational and long time employee, things have changed so much they have almost gone full circle. When I started in the mid 80's, there were some older employees who came in the office at 9:00, would look at the clock and promptly at 11:30 go to lunch, promptly at 5:00 go home with hourly breaks in between. It seemed stunning to me back then. After the layoffs began in the 90's, those who were left kept on picking up what others had been doing and making sure the job was getting done and customers cared for. The people I at least worked with would work 24+ hours straight if we had to at salary to make sure customers would not even think there could be a void. Over the years this cycle continued. IBM finally opened its doors to much more hiring and we had lots of fresh talent generally called Millenials. Many of us older employees began to notice that there were quite a few of these folks who could not come in before 9, needed lunch promptly at 11:30 and were out the door by 5:00 with breaks every hour. Older employees were treated as if they needed 16 hours a day to keep up. This was not true. It was to make up for the slack and avoid the void. In recent years we are seeing gen x and I believe and many of them (keep in mind these statements are not all encompassing to every person in the group range - just some notable patterns) seem to have much stronger work ethics. They are not as staunch and set in their ways and we easily learn from each other and enjoy each others perspective. We also seem to lose them faster.

The cradle to grave care mentality of IBM went out the door almost 20 years ago. We have also seen the rise and fall of the pitting of employees against each other through PBC process. So what would make it more toxic over the last 10 years? It is the corporate policies that continue to erode overall benefits, deny raises and bonuses, the notion that employees, especially older ones are commodity, an HR that determines who is fit to learn new tasks and who is considered dead weight based on age and years, and the very, very, very bloated self-serving executive leadership who promise the moon or turn a blind eye to those who will kiss their ring and only take care of themselves. This is being taught as acceptable practice to newer employees.

Yes any employee can choose to leave. We all know that anyone can be replaced with another person or digitally. Many stay because they actually enjoy and take pride in the products or areas they work in and can turn the noise down on everything else. Of course then they are deemed to not be team players...

Maybe we should create an "Ever Downward!" song for Palmisano and Rometty.

I've been around long enough to know _colleagues_ who were around long enough to recall the 'glory years'. Way WAY back the company even had a SONGBOOK (circa 1935) that employees would sing from!

https://www.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/music/pdf/SB1.pdf

Fast forward even 80 years (to the middle of Ginni's tenure). All you need to ask yourself is, would any employee in 2015 sing aloud how great IBM or Ginni is?

Well, this is a double perspective to the question. My dad was hired and moved to Boca Raton when before they had the main Boca Site (1968 I think and he was working in Pompano maybe). I grew in an entire neighborhood that was 95%+ IBM families. IBM was a Family Company then. Moms stayed at home to raise the kids or went to the IBM Rec Center with the other IBM Moms. All medical was paid for, there were family parties, Christmas parties (actual Christmas and not Holiday parties), annual carnival, and a ton of other family activities. As kids we were always getting hurt and going to the hospital. All medical was paid and Dad had all necessary leave for family medical issues.

It was this way until late 80s when IBM was being looked at as a hostile takeover candidate. The stock price was approaching a level where large commercial banks could buy them out on stock, seize the pension to cover most of the takeover, give a pittance to the government to pay all IBM retirees about $0.30 on the dollar, and sell off the pieces of IBM as profit for the takeover. That is when it all changed. It stopped being a career company and just a behemoth of an old style thinking. My dad took the FAP (2 years + $25k) to retire early and bridged 5 years to meet retirement. He left work on Friday as a retiree, started back 2 weeks later in the same position as a Supplemental. Medical, dental, and pension were all covered. Now he was in the same job, being paid hourly with a 20% bump in pay, get 1.5x for overtime. He did this for 2-3 years until IBM found out many of the people that took the FAP were Supplemental employees with 20% pay bumps in the same job. They ended the Supplementals and around 96, they all left on a Friday as a Supplemental and started Monday as a contractor. As a contractor, my dad and a few of his friends negotiated with their bosses on their contract fees as consultants. Yep, 25% pay bump on top of the 20% they made as Supplemental.

I started in 1996. It was simply a place for a job and not career growth. IBM still had a chance, but never made it. I did get 14 years of great working and 3 years of sh–e from Services division. Then, we were bought out by Lenovo and it was garbage since.

Key highlights from my life at IBM for 45 years...
As kids, Skipper Chuck coming to the IBM Christmas Party and all that went with the party

Annual IBM Family Fun Day

Giant department parties when someone earned a share of stock. It was $500 a share back then so it was a big deal when someone earned one full share.

Having to call my dad (Financial Planner) out of an Executive meeting because I needed to go to the hospital. Him telling me the story when the Exec wound up leaving and driving him to the hospital because his car was faster. My dad was not an Exec, but when I told him I needed an ambulance, IBM went to work. Turns out that meeting was the final decision meeting on OS/2 vs Bill Gates version of Windows. They decided not to payoff Bill Gates $100k for what turned out to be Windows.

Watching it turn into a company that abandoned America and shifted massive workforce to India and others. Watching them get rid of long time IBMers and replace them with H1Bs.

The only thing I care about IBM at this point is my mom's pension. That is it.

I've been here for almost 20 years. Yes, it's a very different company. When I started, the team I was on had >20 full-timers (in the same discipline), several contractors, and FOUR first-line managers to manage them all

At the lowest point a few years ago, I was the only full-timer. Peers were mostly RA'd, several left, all contractors cut. Down to 1 FLM, who took on the OTHER 3 managers' products PLUS several more today.

Yet same amount of output is expected, so for TEN YEARS the team was back-filled with a small army on interns, who did 16-month terms, rotating every May. Extreme waste of time bringing co-ops up to speed... Basically training for half their time, so they can be somewhat productive for the final 8 months. Rinse and repeat for 10 years.

I've since left that team. I talked with my former FLM who mentioned they got 1 or 2 hiring tickets for ENTRY level full-timers, but (i) these are to backfill for others in the larger team who are retiring (ii) lost ALL funding for even co-ops!

And that's just the changes re: staffing & the penchant for RAs.

Here's a fun tidbit... I've been around long enough to recall that I was allowed to work from home a couple days a week when I first started. Back then, IBM reimbursed you for your home internet expense, even if you worked a couple of days a week from home.