AT&T Cyber Employees - Prepare to get HOSED - post regarding AT&T layoffs

AT&T Cyber Employees - Prepare to get HOSED

If you’re in the BU being sold off to WillJam Ventures LLC, just know that the lack of transparency on your benefits and compensation post-close is intentional. You should be demanding faster and clearer answers from AT&T HR right now, while you still have time. Call your Employee Relations Manager. Flood the inbox.

What you’ve been told:

The buyer committed to maintaining your AT&T salary & benefits for 1 year.

What you haven’t been told:

Which benefits? What salary? Is AT&T giving the buyer your current (outdated) 2023 salary? Or the new salary you should be getting after your expected March 1st pay raise? If (and when) the buyer decides to cut headcount, will you be given the same severance benefit as AT&T? Likely NOT. If you have unused maternity and paternity leave, take it NOW. Answers have already come back that the buyer is not obligated to honor it.

You won’t get much help from your leadership here, they have likely been given generous bonuses to get this over the finish line and don’t much care about your individual circumstances. That’s why you keep getting answers like, “we’ll just have to wait and see what the buyer offers us after the close."

But know this: AT&T will not speak to you after this closes. You won’t get any help from or even be able to speak with AT&T HR any longer. There is already lots of excitement about how much easier it will be to deal with legacy telco minded staff who are used to the protections of a relatively employee friendly HR organization. The gloves come off after the VC takes the reigns.

If you want to know how you’re likely to be treated, just call anyone who has been through this before in similar sales. Ask them if AT&T helped ensure that their people didn’t get sc--wed out of their retirement because they were only days away. Ask them if the 401K benefit (match) was slashed right away. Ask them if they got a raise from their new employer in the first or second year.

If you don’t know already, you are about to find out just what it’s like to work for a VC firm. It’s about the bottom line not the employee. It’s about slashing costs to improve profitability so that it can be resold. Sad, because the employees were part of the equation on the value of AT&T Cyber, they are being told they are not releaseable, even if they are out hundreds of thousands of dollars on their pension. You are stuck on this train no matter where its headed. But AT&T HR will not even try to get even the basic guarantees for it’s employees on what’s in store for them on the other side.

Stand up now while you still have time and demand answers and commitments. It’s probably too late as it is. But a united front from the employees who were packaged up for sale is about the only hope you have because AT&T only does for their employees what they are required to do by law, and often not even that much.

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T Cybersecurity never made a dime, in fact I’ve seen credits given to customers well in excess of the annual billing revenue simply due to implementation and billing errors. It never got off the ground and T knew it would not be taken seriously. T is in the global Network business, cybersecurity is at the top of priority for all businesses, T would never sell if we could execute and integrate it seamlessly into our porfolio….we couldn’t. Game over.

“ To the poster saying that T wouldn’t be selling it if it wasn’t profitable, that’s not showing a solid business understanding. Companies sell pff profitable business units and products all the time.”

Mo--n statement of the year so far, lay off the hooch man. How’d they do with Time Warner, or DirecTV. You must be one of those dancing on the Titantic…..goof

“AT&T got rid of their cybersecurity business, do you really want to trust them with your network?”

I felt this deep in my soul. I can visualize a commercial like that.

To the poster saying that T wouldn’t be selling it if it wasn’t profitable, that’s not showing a solid business understanding. Companies sell pff profitable business units and products all the time. It’s a strategy move, not a way to get rid of unprofitable service lines.

For AT&T, they just decided that they didn’t want to be in the cyber business anymore. They will try to say different but their actions betray their priorities. They will probably shoot themselves in the foot here. Competitors will have a field day winning business with the line, “AT&T got rid of their cybersecurity business, do you really want to trust them with your network?”

Meanwhile, Verizon and the other service providers are actively investing in and growing their units.

Ask any of the business teams how they feel about this decision and you’ll see how unpopular a move it really is.

T has Cybersecurity ? Who knew?

Cybersecurity employees will plbe asked to interview for their jobs at the new company.

I know these employees would like to stay positive, for many reasons I totally understand. But for so many other reasons which history has shown us this simply won’t end well for those employees. If thought there was a viable, profitable business there, they would not have jettison it. T was too late in establishing core competency around commercial cysbersecurity, it was never a serious endeavor as proven by the fact they simple whitelabeled other companies products. Good luck to you all.

"Talk to your union steward. Lol'n."

You wouldn't be Lol'n if you knew any union employees who were sold to Frontier or other companies.

Shrugged off our questions is right. For weeks!!

Xandr might have been sold in only four years (2022) but it was filled with Bellheads who took lateral and promotion transfers from other business units.

https://about.att.com/story/2022/xandr-microsoft.html

I have some major concerns that they shrugged off most of our HR questions and chose not to answer them .Then they didn't allow anyone to move internally.

I have another concern that if the sale happens before the bonus if we would actually get the bonus. I really don't trust this entire process.

Do you think they will try to ship SOC jobs offshore to save money?

The first 6 months will be a complete disaster. They’ll have no idea what is going on, spend that time looking for a job, they won’t have a handle on anything or anyone for at least 6 months. Then the layoffs will start quickly. Remember what venture capital companies do….it never, ever ends up good for employees.

This hits hard. You spend decades trying to move up the ladder and the company sells you off like chattel.
I feel like the Xandr resources now.

Xander was bought in 2018, sold in 2021.

maybe you meant, "spend year or two moving up the ladder and then they well you"

Some of T’s most valuable resources, sold to a company only concerned with seeing who will buy them after they obliterate the employee base and cost structure.

This hits hard. You spend decades trying to move up the ladder and the company sells you off like chattel. Worse, the new owner doesn't let you keep your leave benefits. It's not the worst outcome for people who risked their careers to move to AT&T's newest venture but it's far from the best.

I feel like the Xandr resources now.

Told you so…..

If you didn't take advantage of your title and learn this security cr-p, shame on you. If you know your stuff, shame on them. Good luck.

Industry certifications, do not necessarily prove or disprove talent, but they are nice to have for sure.

The reality is the vast majority of the business unit is deeply skilled in cyber security, and the lack of credentials and cyber understanding is mostly just limited to the sales teams and the senior leaders. A large majority of the sales people in the cyber security unit came there because of the compensation plans that were much better than the rest of AT&T. Their ability to get the job was mostly on their ability to know how to navigate AT&T, not on how to actually solution and design cyber security. That’s a great skill inside AT&T, but worthless outside of AT&T.

Talk to your union steward. Lol'n.

No communication and rushing us forward. But as we’ve gotten some details , I’m physically nauseous. My director told me that they were told on Monday that they are forcing them to forfeit their equity. If they are going to treat her like that considering how hard she works, I am scared how they will treat the rest of us.

Business as usual for AT&T. This is how they treat their people, as chips to be bargained with.

A lot of T employees in the cybersecurity division should he more concerned about lack of industry qualifications for their positions.

We keep being told business as usual but what does that even mean? Lack of transparency and poor/no communication from ATT and William is appalling

I used to think it was illegal to sell people. But the OP is absolutely right. Just ask the people who used to be AT&T employees and now work for IBM. Oh wait.... you probably can't.

This explains a lot. What an employee relations manager? How do I find out who that is for me?

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AT&T Cyber Employees - Prepare to get HOSED

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