Thread regarding IBM layoffs

MCC huddle tomorrow. Is this it?

Is tomorrow (Thursday Feb 29th) the big RA day or is it first week of April like last year in the US?

Unfortunately, customers who are male and make purchasing decisions are likely to buy from a good looking female vendor. A lot is of make chauvinism still out there.

Kinda like here in the US... at least in Sales... IBM exclusively hires young and very cute girls out of college. So much about diversity... OR isn't physical appearance a parameter of diversity? Ugly, old, crippled, disabled, etc... no need to apply!

What a shame IBM!

Visited both City Gate and Info Park in Budapest and I agree - wasn't sure if I was at IBM or at an audition for modelling.

Budapest is Club DiCaprio

IBM is just playing follow the AI leader Even Google/Amazon/Microsoft are doing the same thing Expect a 4-5% cut when this is completed

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ciscos-expanded-partnership-nvidia-overshadowed-153025562.html

Based on the comment down below - it looks like Eastern Europe is cleaning house. I remember visiting an IBM Budapest location (Info Park) and it seemed predominantly female and under 30. Modelling agencies should be camped out at this location scouting for talent on the termination date for the RAs.

So how many from the US are gone?

RT is the source of their supply. He has better $hit than the dispensaries can legally peddle

from 3hmz post:

"IBMers leave the company as ambassadors"

LOL!

Can we get just a little bit of what those execs are smoking?

If IBM is getting serious about efficiency, I would expect them to apply the sale of weather towards that efficiency. Remember the sale (1 billion) is a loss vs the purchase price (2 billion). The end result when all is said and done will be Europe headcount will go down by 5k and NA will go down by 10k.

So the real question is Will the 4% efficiency RA (not stranded costs like last year) apply to the rest of the world, or is it just in Europe? I would suspect it should come to NA as their management structure is quite similar

It doesn't seem like Eastern Europe is this paradise for new hires, quite the opposite (read below)

Source: European Work Council

Statement – Resource Action with primary focus on support staff in most European countries

“We are seeing increased productivity in our business, which will lead to workforce rebalancing fairly consistent with 2023 levels”, SVP and CFO of IBM Corporation Jim Kavanaugh stated at the presentation of IBM’s 4Q and FY 2023 corporate financial results on January 24th, 2024. “IBM will likely spend the same amount on restructuring as it did in 2023 – $400 million – when our workforce was reduced by about 3.900 jobs” he added in response to questions of Bloomberg.

At today’s Extraordinary Meeting, it was officially confirmed that a Resource Action (RA) will be implemented worldwide, which will impact Europe more significantly than in 2023. IBM senior management stipulated that this RA is not a typical financial action but should be much more regarded as a ‘transformative’ action in support of IBM’s strategic transformation. Compared to last year’s workforce rebalancing, which was aimed at carving out ‘stranded costs’ in just a handful of European countries, the focus this time is primarily at reducing the level of Support Staff employees in most European countries. Around 80% of the current reduction target is aimed at IBM’s Enterprise Operations & Support (EO&S) and Q2C missions, Finance & Operations including Procurement, CIO, Human Resources, Marketing & Communications and Global Real Estate. Especially our International Centers in Slovakia and Hungary are impacted. With
reference to external benchmarks, IBM senior management indicated that in the IT-industry the ratio between so called ‘direct’ customer facing and ‘indirect’ support roles lies around 95 to 5, where current ratios within IBM Europe show a different picture.

The membership discussed the information and details provided about the size, scoping criteria, employment implications and timelines for Europe. Apart from a handful of smaller European member states, the current restructuring impacts all European countries. The IBM EWC estimates that approximately half of IBM’s global reduction target is aimed at optimizing European staffing levels all over the continent. European member states covered by the IBM EWC Agreement must downsize their overall staffing levels on average by approximately 4%.

Especially for Italy and Spain this percentage lies well below the European average, because these two countries were in scope of the 2023 optimizations too.
As in 2023, also this year Slovakia is targeted with the highest reduction accounting for roughly one-third of the total European reduction target. Especially Slovakia’s International Center in Bratislava has to absorb significant reductions of staff which amount approximately to 40% in CIO and more than 25% in EO&S/Q2C. The impact on Hungary’s International Centers supporting EO&S/Q2C and CIO from Budapest is significant as well, with reduction targets of almost 60% and 40% of current staffing levels respectively, while IBM’s Finance mission in Sofia, Bulgaria must downsize by more than 50%. The IBM EWC questions what will be left of our footprint in these centers and whether sufficient critical mass remains on-site to ensure adequate support to the business. IBM senior management confirmed at today’s meeting that
IBM’s International Centers around Europe continue to remain a relevant and critical part in IBM’s global delivery and support strategy.

After open and constructive discussion and dialogue, and after raising several questions, the IBM EWC membership did not receive any insight in the financial business case behind the current Resource Action. The team regrets that for example no KPIs to measure its success and no data regarding the Return on Investment were provided and this prevents the IBM EWC from thoroughly assessing the justification and value add of the current operation.

The membership plans to hire external expertise to conduct a detailed analysis of the current situation and to make a comparison of the new reality as soon as the RA has been concluded. The IBM EWC observes that especially in smaller and medium sized countries around Europe, the number of support staff employees is already low to sometimes marginal. Additional optimizations could completely erase current staff and are regarded as sub-optimum with the risk of further increasing workloads for remaining employees, a negative impact on the continuity of quality support and the possibility of additional work-related stress and mental illnesses. This should be actively monitored and avoided.

The IBM EWC remains positive and supportive to the company’s focus on internal redeployment based on IBM’s Business Driven Mobility (BDM) Framework. Where BDM is not providing suitable and sustainable job alternatives inside the company, the IBM EWC can support alternative solutions by offering tailor made voluntary solutions to employees to pursue a career outside IBM.

This especially applies to IBM’s Support Staff. At today’s meeting it was explained that all IBM employees should develop so called ‘adjacent skills’ to ensure their internal mobility. After extensive discussion and dialogue about the meaning and definition of adjacency, the team concludes that it is of utmost importance that additional and explicit clarity and information by job role and Business Unit is provided to all employees, to ensure that they can continue to proactively build and develop relevant skills to pursue alternative job opportunities within the company as much as possible.

The IBM EWC estimates that colleagues especially in support roles require additional investment and time to improve their internal employability. The IBM EWC was informed at the meeting that IBM aims at offering voluntary packages as
much as possible to ensure that employees in scope of this Resource Action can leave the company as ambassadors. The membership requests IBM senior management to inform and instruct country management accordingly. The IBM EWC understands that local implementations are guided by local law and practice, however, at European level one consistent and uniform approach for all European countries in scope of this RA should be discussed, outlined and agreed to ensure that IBM-employees all over the continent are treated fairly and equally, according to the same rules and principles. The EWC membership requests IBM senior management to ensure that:

• first and foremost, subcontractor replacement is advertised and applied;
• scoping criteria are transparent and timely agreed and communicated, including a fair objection process and period;
• managers make their employees aware of the adjacent skills in their respective job roles and job families and pro-actively coach their teams in re- and up-skilling programs;
• cross LoB job opportunities are pro-actively facilitated and supported;
• innovative and constructive approaches are developed and offered, such as paid Leave of Absence, paid sabbaticals and Bridge-to-Retirement programs;
• so called ‘domino solutions’ are actively promoted and supported;
• only voluntary programs and generous packages are offered, to allow IBMers to leave the company in a mutually agreed and good spirit;
• outplacement support is offered to all employees in scope on acceptance of an offer;
• IBMers leave the company as ambassadors.

Based on the corporate announcement and additional information provided at today’s meeting, the IBM EWC concludes that the company wants this RA to be implemented in this first quarter, leaving the impacted employees only a few weeks to make up their minds. IBM senior management explained that they have no indication about any pressure or unfair timelines and that all time required will be given to support the local information and consultation processes within the European countries in scope. The EWC membership requests IBM senior management to continue the dialogue on the current Resource Action at European level as well, to provide regular status updates and to give additional insight in the business case and rationale.

IBM European Works Council
Madrid, Spain – February 8, 2024

@2syf Globalization is breaking down, and IBM will eventually face a horrible reckoning for their labor practices over the years. In this day and age of widespread communication, IBM will face two challenges: Not only will the local employees in each country demand higher pay, but the people who were dismissed over the years are warning future generations about IBM's practices of labor arbitrage.

The bottom line is that IBM sold out its employees and its businesses for cash over decades, and the whole world knows it. IBM can promote "Growth Market Units" or whatever as much as they like. If they ever become successful again and want to hire talent, then that talent will come at a huge premium...no matter which country they are in.

Thanks @1dpu+1r6FvPHP = " JA said as much in last MCCTH. “Go check GOM if you’d like to move.”

IBM did this when they opened up the Growth Market Units. All employees were free to look for a job in any of the Growth Counties at the local salary in the country.

Key point: These moves were not International Assignments with relocation packages where you kept your home country salary. The process was that you resigned from your home country (example US) and you joined as a new employee in the new country (example Kenya) .

It was assumed that if you applied to the job in another country, that you were willing to pay your own way to get there and you would find a place to live etc. And IBM would help with the work visa.

This system worked best for people who had few financial or family obligations in their home country and wanted an adventure in a new country and could live on a lower salary.

Any news on new job openings in Bratislava? We have not had any for more than 2 years.

Sure the people very talented. Still mass layoffs of other talented people. Families and children impacted. Doesn’t matter the cities are “lovely” when your kids lose their healthcare to counties that have universal care.

We moved a major workload to eastern Europe. Very talented people there. No language barrier. They speak english very well. The work was done very well and of course less money. It was graphic design and marketing.

Bratislava is lovely!

Second part mostly true. JA said as much in last MCCTH. “Go check GOM if you’d like to move.” True They’ll find a reason to let you go anyway , they not gonna pay to move you. But this is the source.

I think some of you are missing tbe OPs point. People who have jobs today won’t tomorrow. Bottom line. It’s outsourcing and cheap labor exploitation in the classical tradition.

IBM is divided into separate companies for each country...you have IBM US, IBM India, IBM Columbia, IBM Romania, IBM Slovakia, etc. When work is moved overseas, IBM US literally eliminates job positions in the US, and makes contractual arrangements with the foreign entities to have work done. (Other companies operate in a similar fashion.)

What this means in practice is that US managers are not in control of the foreign staff, but rather they are the domain of whatever "IBM company" resides in each country. So the OP is technically true but very open to misinterpretation. IBM US will indeed do the "mass role terminations", but they will not be hiring the replacements. That hiring will be done by the IBM companies residing in each target country.

The managers in IBM US have little control over staffing decisions, nor do they care that much at a contractual level as deals are signed between companies. All that they care about is what work gets done and at what price.

While I don't doubt the layoff piece the other rumor part it total BS. If IBM did that it would mean they would have to pay relocation

Move? To Eastern Europe, South America or India? From the US?

I call BS on this one, because the entire idea sounds ludicrous on its face. The jobs in those countries are reserved for locals.

Unbelievable! What a pathetic company