Anyone has any idea?
12 replies (most recent on top)
They make distinguished engineers out of top leaders of companies they acquire so not everyone earns it via the official path
15 people were fired last march at the Madrid services center (AKA center of excellence, aka we are the best center, aka AR center...)
Quick - How can we come to the conclusion that is all the fault of Indians ! (insert sarcasm)
"If we are to ever become a real leader in anything again, we will need real technical leaders again - STSMs, Principals, Distinguished and Fellows. Unfortunately the best of these are always pushed out first and the ones content with becoming Yes Men are like roaches that survive forever. IBM rewards sycophancy and punishes original thinking - it is like evolution running in reverse and selecting for the worst traits."
cheap labor, stock price (or financial gimmicks), and stolen IP
it will last until the companies get hollowed out and cannot create anymore
they are becoming more like government agencies
then the debt or its interest cannot be paid anymore
then something big (not in a good way) will happen
I struggled to get to STSM after over 20 years at IBM. I present at conferences, publish, mentor, win awards - and all of this in my spare time. I work a very full week trying to convince our resource-constrained execs to make smarter investments and to innovate, however small. It is getting harder and harder to do anything of consequence in The IBM that Arvind Built but I keep trying to innovate even if my Veeps have given up.
I am hearing a lot of envy here and some flat out falsehoods. I know of NO technical leader who was handed a title without earning it. That distinction is reserved for Directors and VPs and management track titles which are purely political. You need more than a pretty face or ability to bend your knee to get a technical title. It was grueling.
If we are to ever become a real leader in anything again, we will need real technical leaders again - STSMs, Principals, Distinguished and Fellows. Unfortunately the best of these are always pushed out first and the ones content with becoming Yes Men are like roaches that survive forever. IBM rewards sycophancy and punishes original thinking - it is like evolution running in reverse and selecting for the worst traits.
I was told I will be gone in the March RA - right after I got an award for my latest book. But I never bent my knee to this executive monoculture. That's the difference.
I suspect that this treatment is pretty common among all senior employees, no matter what organization they are working for. In the US military services for instance, officers who commit misconduct are not given "dishonorable discharges" like the enlisted men. Instead, they are either "dismissed" or are "encouraged" to retire.
The IBM of today is much smaller (in both personnel numbers and IMHO in corporate vision) than it once was. The idea of hundreds (or even dozens) of "Fellows", "Distinguished Engineers" and even "Senior Technical Staff Members" doesn't seem to make much sense anymore. So all those people being forced out should not be a surprise.
I’ve know 2 Fellows in the last 8 years who were forced out. As another commenter mentioned, they were ‘asked to retire’. In both cases I just think they weren’t towing the line of the new leadership and in both cases I believe the Fellows were in the right. Last year we axed a bunch of DEs and debanded some others, but again they are pretending that they left voluntarily.
"There was once a time in our society when titles were treated with much more respect than they are today. For example, every so often you can run across "high school graduation exams" from the 1920s or 1930s or so. To pass the tests, you had to answer questions in geography, history, math, science and English writing that most college grads couldn't answer today."
the standards have/are being reduced to get others in
this has been going on since globalism
for cheap labor and cheap votes
standards are what makes things great
spartans did not become famous because they were fat, lazy, and klutzy
remind me what standards does India have
There was once a time in our society when titles were treated with much more respect than they are today. For example, every so often you can run across "high school graduation exams" from the 1920s or 1930s or so. To pass the tests, you had to answer questions in geography, history, math, science and English writing that most college grads couldn't answer today.
The population in the western world has grown to hundreds of millions of people, many of whom are "college grads". The story is the same in India, Brazil, China, everywhere else. You can get any title you want if you know the right people and put up enough cash. IBM is not alone in worthless titles...just ask any Ivy League grad who drives a cab or waits tables to survive. At least "IBM Fellows" were paid during their tenure..."Harvard Grads" had to pay for their titles, and look where a lot of them ended up.
Fellows, Distinguished Engineers, Principals, Master Inventors, etc. — there was a time these things were supposed to get you “tenure” at IBM. Yet, I’ve seen plenty of people be fired, pushed out, or resign under pressure soon after receiving these supposed honors, because ultimately they are political, not substantive. And while not everyone who receives one of these awards is mediocre, a lot of them are, if we're being honest. It’s little more than corporate pageantry.
These things have always been the equivalent of Office Space flair. People proudly display them on their Blue Pages, and in their bios and introduce themselves as if they've earned an actual PhD after their name, and not a pat on the head from HR.
A lot of these honors are given out by executives like ambassadorships to their favorite pets. I can say this because I was nominated for one of these designations and invited to the inner sanctum for my hindquarters to be appraised. It took one meeting where I listened to an insufferable Distinguished Di-----k with a serious Napoleon complex weigh forth on how we should be so honored to be initiated into this ultra elite secret society, and to be prepared for hazing and punishment, and to make ourselves worthy through sacrifice and acts of fealty, for me to see it for the joke it was. What does it say about you if you need external validation from people like that? I dropped out with zero regrets.
These titles have ALWAYS been worthless outside of IBM, like an Employee of the Year award. No one outside the bubble will recognize it. And, look, if you have one and you’re proud of it, good for you. I’m not sh-----g on you. I’m just saying the prize itself is pretty worthless both outside, and now even inside, of IBM. If you have to explain how your Distinguished Whatever is the IBM equivalent of a Fulbright, maybe it isn’t? It’s giving “It’s the Harvard of Guam.” You’ll know the worth of an honor pretty quickly by how hard you have to justify it to others.
TL;DR Don’t waste your time making yourself worthy of IBM because they will never appreciate it and it won’t save you in a downturn. Make yourself worthy of yourself.
I'd be very surprised if they were canned like rank and file employees. Distinguished Engineers (Band D) and Fellows (Band C) are considered executives, and not regular employees. Their compensation and career paths are different from regular employees.
What I COULD believe is that they either left voluntarily, or "retired" (either voluntarily or because they were asked to retire before being fired). When you're an executive, "layoffs" are not an option.
I was shocked to learn that some great ones where suddenly gone. But unsure if they were laid off or left voluntarily. Either way, bad for IBM.