This was for Amazon, but seems like maybe a good fit here too, eh?
Let's see.
Google this.
"Last month, Insider reported on what appears--at least on the surface--to be an alarming practice at Amazon. According to the reporting, managers at the online retailer intentionally hire people that they know they're going to fire."
I don't know if managers in Cisco hire sacrificial lambs, but I figured out tactics of the managers in my office (I'm in Europe) how to create a sacrificial lamb. I learned it on my own skin. Took me some time, but here it is.
If you were following this website for last several years, you might have learnt how LRs in Cisco work. Crucial elements are that your line manager is not asked who should be terminated; that it has nothing to do with your performance; people that get on the list for the chopping block are the ones that are not aligned with a project that is going to be kept, that is: the people that are aligned to the project that is of the least value, or is assigned to some team's internal tasks that have no visibility outside the team (e.g some technical debt cleaning etc...)
When those that decide about the list of those to be LRd look at the teams and who is assigned to valuable project and who's not, they pick those that seem to be redundant.
Favouritism in my office (or at least in part of my organization) is very strong. Many call it "old boys club". To protect their own people, managers pick "outsiders" - those hired by another manager, reorgd, or simply not liked for whatever reason - and they are kept out of any important projects. That is how managers in my org create sacrificial lambs. They don't know when or if the LR will hit their teams, but they have prepared "lamb" "on the shelf" for when it is needed. I noticed for my manager that he actually ranks people that way, so it is not just one guy and one project, but favourites are always assigned first to the best projects no matter if they are competent or not.
I'm the outsider. My current manager even doubled-down on putting me under the spotlight for this purpose last September, after an year of keeping me out of any meaningful project or work. I was lucky that axeman didn't come to our teams. So I survived. At the moment I even get to work on cool projects because we suddenly became understaffed. However, I know what his plans for me are, I have no illusions.
One additional bad part for being sacrificial lamb is that you are missing out on getting valuable experience that may help you find another job. You're doing stupid tasks and you will not have anything of value to present on any potential job interview.
That is why I'm not deluding myself about my future here, but I'm now trying to use this time with some meaningful work to collect experience for future interviews.
IBM did this while I worked there. I oversaw budgets, project finances, and where all of our $100Ms was going. All of a sudden in the midst of potential layoffs, about 120 new people started in our organization. I only found out because the young woman (22 maybe) shared an office with my co-worker. She was so excited. She was hired as a Project Manager with no project management experience. I asked her what project and she told me the name. All that went on in my head was that they project wasn't even on our roadmap. Turns out all 120 people hired were on that project.
Needless-to-say, there was a layoff 6 weeks later. All of these 120 people were let go with no severance because they had no time with the company. They were all in their early 20s. It lowered the average age of layoff from something around 57 to 43. Believe me, those that knew were able to spot all of these 120 in the disclosed layoff totals. The poor girl was crying her eyes out. I told her when she was notified that the project didn't even exist and after 7-weeks of doing nothing, how did she think she was getting anything done on a project. Turns out her salary was also only $36k/yr. So the 6-7 weeks of work didn't cost IBM anything.
While this might be tempting to inexperienced and naive hiring managers, there's no such corporate-level guidance on the topic as you can imagine. When I hire someone, I want a candidate (a) with the right skillset (b) highly compatible with my team. I never hire cannon fodder, it's just wrong on so many levels.
Those are the ppl managers hire in order to keep the core team members when the next LR is announced.
So, this is common practice at Cisco?
I can't confirm it, but I'm starting to hear talk about it. You know what they say about "Where's there's smoke, there's usually fire."
I know some places have a "last in, first out" policy that protects people with seniority on a team, but that's a double edged sword if the people w/ seniority get too lazy. It also encourages new hires not to bust their a$$ because they'll be the first one out the door even if they work hard, so why be hard working/loyal?
So, this is common practice at Cisco?
We call then sacrificial lambs and loved when one transferred into our dept.
Wow! How deceptive!
It's a strategy to protect your friends family in the department. Makes sense in the corporate world.