Thread regarding Intel Corp. layoffs

20 years ago I proposed a modification to Outlook that would—based on the rank of the invited attendees and the amount of scheduled time— calculate the cost of the meeting and plaster it at the top of the meeting free text pane. This would (theoretically) make the organizer think twice before sending it out, particularly if a culture of having to cost-justify meetings arose. It never went anywhere.

Sounds like it’s needed more than ever.

Sounds like a government bureaucracy or a Soviet style resource manger.

Intel can’t stand the pressure of real competition.

Implosion is likely.

and how about info meetings? Most information can be summarized and sent in an email. Make it so people can opt out of a distribution list if they don't care about the material. but no, it is much more work to write a crisp summary then to call an 'all hands' meeting where you can talk about the information (and in the process waste hours of other people's time). God awful.

Even when email is used for communication information it is completely abused. Do you know how many emails there are where some ELT is blogging or yapping for no reason? And you can't "opt out". So you can have emails with a hundred people on it and no way for people to say 'stop sending me this email'. Here is a great example, CIRCUIT is the internal communication department. Of course, they have to show they add value, so they send out huge amounts of email content. Yes, some is important and some isn't. I emailed the person managing the distribution list and I said, 'heah I like your content but since it is on the web, I can proactively look at it when I need to. Would you mind taking me off your distribution list. I don't need 3 updates a week, it is clogging my mailbox and I am not productive'. The person was shocked. Cognitive dissonance kicked in. How on God's green earth could someone ask not to receive my great content. The person said 'no' we won't remove you. You will just have to sort through your mail. God awful.

I can relate. I was so sick of meetings I set a goal to cut my meeting time to no more then 1/2 of my working hours. I know that sounds like too much for the average worker, but trust me Intel has people that are in meetings more then 90% of the day.

Anyway here is example. I was a manager and people would invite me to a meeting. Sometimes you get invited so people can show that they are being productive. I would say, 'what kind of meeting is this?, decision meeting or info meeting? The person either a) not have a clue or b) may say decision or info. If it was an decision meeting where I felt I didn't need to be a 'decider' I would say, 'why did you invite me? I am not a decider... there are others in the room who's core duty it is to do the analysis for the the meeting and I am not one of them'. I would walk out of the meeting. People would be in shock that someone would miss an opportunity to bloviate. If everyone at Intel was tasked to actually implement the company meeting policy, imagine how life would change at Intel. And I'll tell you, work and life got more enjoyable when I cut meetings down to something near the level that productive companies actually use. Another idea is limit meetings to 15 minutes and make people stand up. And no coffee. Intel people go to a meeting and it feels more like a Starbucks then a tech company.

🤣 Op captured the essence of Intel perfectly. The meetings are the funniest. Intel has core 'effective meetings' class but doesn't even follow it's own rules. For example, if the meeting is a 'decision meeting' you need to limit the meeting to those who are making the decision or have critical information. Well at Intel, the org structure is bloated and redundant so, each 'decision meeting' you need a rep from the 6 departments that all claim they are part of the decision. It really is a disaster. You also have people that show up to maintain the appearance and visibility of adding value. It is a natural tendency, since your job is overlapping with six other people, you know you have to play the game and be in the meeting OR you risk being viewed as a non-contributor. In which case, you are top of list for a layoff. This behavior is self-reinforcing and results in so much wasted time and effort as to be almost incalculable.

Why not take your Power Point Warrior skillz to the next level and become a Scrum Master?

How does Pat only know that culture? I wonder if you worked at Intel with Andy as CEO. It sounds like not.

A gift that keeps giving, in a company that was a monopoly for decades and nobody cared about customers just themselves.

Getting ahead means a culture where competing against each is the way and ppt is king.

Now got a CEO who only knows that culture, see a bright future of failure for Intel