You should start looking for a new job ASAP, if you have any skills. There are many useless engineers and managers at Cisco and I never figured out how they kept their jobs during my years at Cisco. I worked at Cisco for 16 years and finally was fed up and left on my own. There are countless opportunities out there. Cisco has to do this more often and clean up the mess if it intends to survive the fierce competition.
Yours sincerely,
Cisco alum
Alum here too. Y'all are going to be fine. There is a lot of opportunity out there. Me? I'm still not working and living the good life! I had planned and saved for this. After catching up on sleep, exercising and healing from the unseen harm I endured at Cisco for years, I'm enjoying life. Got a new car paid in full out the door and going on a nice trip abroad in June. (note, I was not in sales. The severance was very generous IMHO)
I've taken time to reset, identify my core values to find a job and place to work that match them. I plan to go back to work as a contractor so I have flexibility to leave if it's a toxic work environment. I will not put up with bad management and/or a toxic work place.
You will thrive once you leave.
Agreed 100%. I witnessed the same during my years at Cisco. But it was not just managers. Engineers had become comfortable and reluctant to learn the new technology.
But one thing I like to remind everyone is what you have learned at Cisco will be valuable to you forever. You can apply that technical skills anywhere.
Yours sincerely,
Cisco alum
Completely agree with you. Stayed a bit longer than you; I did get complacent towards the end. I should have moved on instead of waiting for the LR payout.
There are tons of good jobs. You need to be currently relevant if working tech. Cisco is definitely not current, and say that sadly. If you know networking and can implement & troubleshoot, there are plenty of good jobs. I learned post Cisco to trust my skills and stop dealing with wasting time working for toxic fools.
The best part has been completing a few pain in the @$$ projects as a contractor, mostly messed up because of a person or persons running them; then being told I did a great job saving with the infamous "diving catch" managerial blessing...and then telling the "leaders" I am moving on! That is the best feeling for a person like me that is naturally inclined to work through cr@p.
The thing I truly realized is how many toxic, worthless overall, mid-level "leaders" there are at Cisco. They are like cockroaches and float on the misery of others. They should be the ones LR'd. Paid too much, simply to control the fate of others. It starts changing when top garbage leaders go; the behavior is sanctioned.