I have been thinking about why pay is so broken both in our industry and at DXC, and I keep coming back to two issues. First, companies treat hiring as a cost to be minimized rather than an investment in talent. Second, nobody knows what anyone else is actually making, so we are all just guessing at what fair pay looks like.
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It could be very simple. DXC will sell you to a client at $X, and it will keep 60% of all that. If you can get the work, you get the money. The more you do and the better you are the more money you can make. I think you'll find everyone just got interested in keeping the client happy and doing a good job because it makes a difference when they do. It also makes a difference if they don't. As it stands we all know no amount of effort changes anything. Hence why most of DXC is now asleep and the people who do need a job and do want to work cannot get anything done.
Get Elon Musk in - he'd lay off pretty much everyone, and just start again. Those who can and want to work at a modern pace can reapply. Everyone else, which is pretty much everyone left in DXC will go. Best done soonest before the brand that was DXC / CSC / HP is totally trashed.
@j2 Management keeps getting swayed by the sales team’s polished pipeline projections, even though they consistently underdeliver. As a result, layoffs keep getting postponed based on overly optimistic assumptions. A more realistic approach is to assume no meaningful new-account growth beyond offsetting basic churn and make staffing decisions accordingly instead of delaying difficult decisions in the hope that projected sales will finally come through. The company needs a minimum 30% headcount reduction as soon as possible.
They can't afford pay rises, but they can afford to have people sitting about with nothing to do. It seems to be in the hope that their mental health will reach rock bottom and they will then just quit, or be off sick so long that it becomes the sick pay insurance companies problem. I've pretty much done nothing this year and yet - it's a no sorry on my VR applications. And they wonder why I'm not enthused by anything DXC!
@fs There is no salary increase coming.
Core operations are losing money quarter after quarter. No company in the financial position DXC is in uses free cash flow for salary increases. No company spends cash now to make less cash in future.
When margins are weak and core operations are under pressure, that money goes into capex, restructuring, debt reduction and other one-time items such as layoffs and cost cutting to stop the bleeding and push the company back toward profitability to make more money than it does before.
You employees are basically being viewed as cost centers with login credentials. If you leave on your own accord the company books it internally as “operational efficiency improvement”.
The company is using what little free cash flow it has to improve margins and market-facing KPIs. It is not going to spend money making its operational results worse by expanding payroll costs. Right now, the financial strategy is survival, stabilization and investor optics, not generosity.
Capisce?
@fk so the dxc wage bill is $10bn?
That's about double what I've heard the number is.
They've now got $1.7bn in the bank BTW and still no idea how to use it to make more money.
On the CES town hall today Ramnuts or one of his buddies said that a 1% pay rise would cost $100m. Maybe stop the share buybacks and we could get a 6% rise then?
I think we all agree. It's cr-p company with illogical polices. Most people have an eye on getting out one way or another. It make little odds what you say or do, so most people don't even try anymore. There is a lot of waffle on calls, which amounts to absolutely nothing. There might be a pay review in 2027, but don't count on it. And given nobody expects to be here by then - you can see why we're all just enjoying the sunshine and doing what we've been told - which is usually no clear direction - so they can't say it's not been done!!
You're being too logical about why salaries are so unequal. It's a simple reason - They were so messed up under M1 that they had no intention of solving it under M2. Remember HR under M1 was absolutely horrible. M2's answer was aggressively hire in low cost and it will work its way out, eventually. The problem was low-cost salaries then rose very quickly due to a shortage of cloud expertise under M2. Also, DXC HR and Talent Acquisition kept hiring operators when the need was for cloud skills. They have been paying premium for the wrong talent. High-cost countries are intentionally starved when they have had the higher skilled talent, and have been the most productive. Now DXC is very heavy in low cost countries, but the costs are creeping up, and skills alignment still off. AI is now the driver for cost of scarce talent. It's also a way to replace operators in low cost, which ultimately increases the cost per employee. Workforce in high cost countries keeps shrinking and there is no intention of leveling any salaries anywhere. Like any company with a skill shortage, they will pay what they need to for new, highly skilled, workers. They automatically assume current employees don't have the skills, and those that are skilled are locked into current work anyway. The HR and workforce management systems are so awful they work against the employees and the business. The only way to get ahead in DXC is to skill-up and apply to a higher level open position. Management will not help, they want to keep their area the same, it's up to you. If you want to increase pay, it's up or out.
When I joined DXC, there was always a KT session after any work that I did.
After a few sessions, I realised It was always one way, and always to the lazy shysters who seemed to avoid real work, do very little and were paid a lot more.
Every year, I thought it would get better but it never did - I was in the same hole - always assigned to take over from those who had done very little, had ate most of the budget and delivered nothing. I was put in there to "save the day". Most of the time I did, but at review time, the projects were always judged badly because of the lazy messups, that left before I had to take the hit.
Also, rubbingt salt in wounds, these same feckless people were the ones highly prized at DXC.
In other words, if you work hard and say "YES", you will get known as the fool that kops it, and you will always be treated badly in DXC
DXC doesn't think it's necessary to set fair and balanced pay so it doesn't. It obviously isn't affecting what it plans on doing. We the employees think it will ultimately damage the company beyond repair. Some might say we've already passed the point of no return on that front. I think if you asked us if we'd like to average the pay across our team, or take a VR and just go - 90% would say VR please. They don't need us. AI is going to do it all! Goof luck on that front...
OP is looking at this the wrong way - THERE ARE NO PROBLEMS KEEPING SALARIES UNFAIR.
Its always the employees fault - Not enough are leaving DXC.
Its not the fault of the individual, it is the group's fault - rather like nature curbing the herd by starvation, because the herd ate all the food in the field
A job role has to be worth something. How you value it I know is hard. But when you see your job role being advertised at significantly more for someone the company has never met you know there's a problem. My salary is fine for what I do. But given the company is quite happy to pay double that for someone else to do the same thing - this is where engagement gets destroyed. Especially given there is no way to change my salary, there is nothing I can do or say which will see it slowly climb. So every year I do less and less, and nothing seems to change. They can say it's a problem. But it's only words. If it's really a problem, put me on a course. But that costs money. If it's really a problem let me go. But then they'd have to spend time and money hiring someone and they would want that higher salary. So no DXC I am not engaged to do more or improve. Better service comes with the expectation of a higher salary. Knowing that door closed years ago - you get what you pay for!
In most industries loyalty is financially punished. Employees who stay too long at one company are often paid significantly less than external hires doing the same job averaging between 20 to 30%. In companies like DXC the gap is even worse. If you want faster salary growth, change employers regularly.
If you look in workday you'll find your job role. You can't see anyone else's (unless you manage people).
It's not whatever you have on your email signature or even necessarily what work you are actually doing.
Next you can ask your manager to tell you what the pay band is for your "job"
You'll discover there is a massive range on any of them. You'll probably be no more than the middle of the band if you've been here for some time.
How does this help you?
Not one bit.
You can't get a rise within your band, you can't get a promotion in place (ie without applying for another role)
You can apply for another open role (max of two levels above where you are) , but it doesn't come with a rise. Probably your new role still has a pay band that covers what you were already earning. Yes those pay bands are that wide. So HR will tell you that you're already paid in line with "market value".
You've just taken on a load more responsibility and work for nothing.
Fun isn't it?
And people still don't understand why everyone is fed up and not pushing themselves.
Agree here - other co's operate garde scales. It's published information which grade you're on, but not the specific salary, but you can work it out. You know the scale of salary and even if a new employee started at the top of the scale, you know they can't be on more than someone who's been there 10 years and reached the top naturally. You then also know which roles to go after to go up to the next grade.
At DXC - people's salary for the same role is seemingly random and just a matter of timing and good or bad fortune. The people who don't get the recognition give up and stop trying. And it becomes a game of I'll do what you pay me for, and they'll only pay you for what you do. It seems to me that they could balance it and get the best out of everyone.
At it stands, and with pay rises effectively frozen for 10 years now. I'm assuming I will never get another pay rise again, and so my attitude reflects that.