The thing that's always overlooked in the Cisco layoffs is the negative customer impact. I'm not minimizing the employee impact in any way. It's got to be absolutely horrible, and it will probably be me someday. I'm a white male in my early 50s.
Part of what's driving the layoffs is a poor performance from Cisco because they've gotten rid of so many really good and results-oriented people. I can't believe how many have been impacted in the past few years. Real, rock star performing employees were just the wrong age and demographic. They resonated with customers who saw the value of Cisco through them. Now, there's less business after terminating those that add value to customers who, in return, spend less.
This is especially true in Customer Experience. Salespeople cringe at trying to sell these snake oil services. It takes excellent sales and support to sell and renew the snake oil portfolio, yet they eliminate the people who know the customer and their business. They also keep promoting services leadership that can't lead their way out of a wet paper bag.
Last week, I saw a post on LinkedIn with Alistair Wildman; I cringed at his fake message: he's the king of snake oil. He's a horrible leader; he only cuts costs by cutting great people. He did the same thing in Europe; then they brought him here. He brought in Harry Caldwell and Jason Mclaren, equally incompetent people in services who are packaged as leaders. No one views them as leaders nor respects them, especially sales, and I'm certain those working for them. I'm sure they have their su-k-ups. There were far better people at the VP level who were natural leaders than Harry and Jason, but they got pushed aside. It's likely they don't drink the cool aid and actually care about customers. The current services leadership is the absolute worst I've ever seen in all my years at Cisco!
Cisco's services used to be world-class. Now, they want lower and lower grade levels, but not the experience that resonates with customers. The post on LinkedIn was something about customer success, in which Alistair and his su-k-ups are all talk, as they cut the performers just like our sales organization; only good people seem to go.
Then there's TAC....don't get me started on how that's been ruined; it's horrible, and again, they've cut the good people. The employees there are still excellent, but they've gutted the organization by lowering grade levels, and there are too few of them. Every customer I interface with complains about TAC.
About a month ago, a coworker commented that she was taking a course with her daughter and stated, "I'm going to be 52 in a couple of months, and you know how Cisco is with people in their 50s."
It could be any of us in this next round; performance doesn't matter, but those outside of a certain age (under 50) and demographic are less likely to be impacted. However, our Cisco customers will also be seriously negatively impacted.