LRs are never fun for anyone. I cant fathom anyone enjoying this. I feel for all impacted. BUT it is a reality of large companies today. While I do feel the constant specter of worry about stability, I got over that for the most part 4 years out of school. If you do what you can the best that you can, make yourself as indispensable as possible, and contribute to the company's goals, that's all you can do. Focus on what you can control. There is no company-level conspiracy or hidden agenda when these things happen -- just business. Though I would be lying if i didn't admit to seeing some level unfairness in pockets -- but life is not guaranteed to be fair. Nevertheless, If it's not for you, then there are socialist counties you can move to -- or there's always academia :) But take personal accountability for your career and stay relevant and impactful -- wherever that may be.
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I don't think Cisco is evil.
Evil can be produced with intent but it can also be the side effect of the profoundly stupid and that's the case at Cisco. They've taken a lot of awesomely capable people and made them far worse than useless.
HR spends more time on this forum writing these stupid statements instead of paying attention to the exit interview comments and trying to use that feedback to improve the workplace. HR are useless.
...could NOT handle.
Yes, Slave, it is a stupid comment. What does chasing a piece of pigskin around have to do with brainpower and intellectual talent. Personally, in a white collar role, most folks are far more effective with increasing age - certainly I am. The complexity of the situations I can now handle and the ability to understand the problem at hand and have a plan to address is vastly more than even five years ago.
Maybe I would not be as effective digging a ditch with a pick and shovel by 60+, but that's not what we're talking about. Although I've seen plenty of old, tough-as-nails country types that could work under punishing conditions most young 'en's could handle.
That's a stupid comment. The "market" for labor is $2 per day, because that's the world-wide median pay for one day of human sweat, so really, that's all any of us are "worth". Now, many of us, particularly in developed countries get more than that, recognizing local conditions, work laws, and the ability of our labor to add value. The same is true down to a company level. I unlock a lot of value for Cisco because of my skills, as well as experience in how the company works, and effectiveness in getting things done inside Cisco.
Flipping $3 burgers only unlocks so much value.
Would I be able to be that effective elsewhere? No, likely not. Maybe after some years. Would I expect to make as much outside Cisco? Maybe, maybe not. It all depends how I would fit in the new organization.
In many ways, Cisco doesn't fully utilize what I can do for them: 1) because people at my level are basically ignored and 2) culturally my South Asian management regards me as lower down the totem pole and therefor I'm placed in a very small, and well-defined box. Basically a white Dalit.
If I could find a new organization that had the right role then I could conceivably be paid more, if the new management understood how to leverage what I do, and wanted to keep me away from competitors. Those jobs don't come up very often, and not necessarily where I live, so some serendipity comes into it.
As an outsider, this quote baffle me..
"If every company says "it's just business" and fires older workers and won't hire older workers because they're too expensive, they'll just end up on Social Security, unemployment and possibly welfare. Then the taxpayers will have to take care of them and to pay for that, taxes will go up increasing costs and lowering profits and causing companies to cut even more older workers. Then the older workers won't be able to do anything but serve fries at McDonalds"
If your worth to outside is just as good as a McDonald worker, Cisco ALREADY did you a service by overpaying you many years. This is not an age thing. People get fired in general because either :
1) they don't worth their pay
2) the company cannot afford to keep them.
Now, being older, it is harder to get a good job. No different than Adrian Peterson is not getting a 10 million contract at age 32. Is adrian no longer good? Not necessary, but his opportunity is being pulled down by statistic of his peers. The stats said : 32 years old RB don't stay good for long.
So, companies do what Viking did to Adrian. How can you tell your employee that he/she is no longer a superstar? Let him/her find out his/her market value outside.
I understand people are bitter when the LR hits them and they are convinced it should be someone else. So OK I learned I will be impacted. I hold no animosity against Cisco or the executive team. They are trying to do right by employees with decent packages. Admit it.
It is a very rough time in the industry, and if you're surprised you didn't listen nor did you do research. The executive team is trying to balance things between a meltdown and survival and applying some benchmarks.
Yes I was pulling over 200k a year. It will be hard but not even close to impossible to make the same or more elsewhere. If anything it was my fault for allowing myself to be pigeonholed is similar roles for 5 years. It was easy and comfortable. And boring
I don't think Cisco is evil. It is facing an existential situation, and setting out people on lifeboats. If anything they could be more aggressive and heartless. They aren't. Yet.
Good luck everybody, I am off to take a timeout and shall re-emerge refreshed elsewhere.
There is no company-level conspiracy or hidden agenda when these things happen -- just business. Though I would be lying if i didn't admit to seeing some level unfairness in pockets -- but life is not guaranteed to be fair. Nevertheless, If it's not for you, then there are socialist counties you can move to -- or there's always academia :) But take personal accountability for your career and stay relevant and impactful -- wherever that may be.
BUT I stand by my original statement. Have been through multiple companies in similar situations and the fact remains that you alone are responsible for your career. This LR stinks on a personal level, as it has countless times before -- at Cisco and at company __. But it is what it is. You have a choice. And we are not entitled to anything.
Stop drinking the cool-aid. There IS a company-level conspiracy. Cisco USED to let go of the bottom 5%. Normally, that's a good thing. Get rid of those that don't perform. Stinks when you're on a great team and even above average performance and being relevant and impactful doesn't keep you out of the bottom 5%. A good manager rotates the bottom 5% around to keep everyone if they're truly above average or lets go the one who isn't at least average. Bad managers play politics/good-ole-boy network and force unpopular people even if they perform well into the bottom 5% to get rid of them. But, for the most part, it's fair and a good way to keep the company moving forward. NOW, Cisco is letting go employees based on their age using the excuse that they're too expensive. Well, guess what? At some point in everyone's life, you get older, you gain a lot of experience and you move up in pay. If every company says "it's just business" and fires older workers and won't hire older workers because they're too expensive, they'll just end up on Social Security, unemployment and possibly welfare. Then the taxpayers will have to take care of them and to pay for that, taxes will go up increasing costs and lowering profits and causing companies to cut even more older workers. Then the older workers won't be able to do anything but serve fries at McDonalds and McD's won't have to hire unreliable teenagers who then won't be able to get jobs.
I was let go. I was relevant. I was impactful. But I still got let go. And as someone else said, it hurts when the CEO says he wants everyone to RETIRE from Cisco and then you get booted out the door. Cut costs by doing away with manager off-site events. Cut costs by doing away with the "Fun Fund" quarterly events and don't do lay-offs and you won't have to bribe people to get their morale up. Have some of those VERY EXPENSIVE executives take pay cuts and save jobs.
Does Cisco "owe" me anything? Only respect. Am I entitled to my job? No. But Cisco is going downhill fast by taking the short-term profit solution by getting rid of experience people and bringing in 2 or 3 replacements at half the cost. Same cost to the company, but they don't get twice the work done because it takes a while for the new people to get up to speed, they have less experience and have to learn stuff about Cisco's environment. There are so many custom processes and tools in use at Cisco, that at least in Engineering and Support, you can't expect someone who knows how to do the equivalent job outside of Cisco to be able to come into Cisco and follow the Cisco processes immediately.
The amount of corporate knowledge about processes that walked out the door with me is irreplaceable in the short-term. There are back-end processes that run on servers and are almost forgotten about because they "just work". In a year or two, when it's time to replace that server with a new one, if someone doesn't know about all the jobs that run on it, when it suddenly get replaced, or maybe moved to a new network, and those backend jobs that just worked suddenly stop working, how is that new person going to know what broke, where to look for that job, and how to fix it? But I'd have known to make sure that my jobs/processes got migrated as part of the server replacement. And before someone says, "Well, if you'd have documented it, the new guy would have known to make sure it got migrated." I can tell you it was documented. Question is, did the documentation get migrated to the newest/current system? How many links and search results still point to IWE?!? Or the ciscowiki? I had a hard time making sure all my documentation got migrated between systems when I was there. I know the new guy won't know which version of documentation is current when he finds 3 copies between the various collaboration tools.
But, hey, it is what it is. I'm gone, I'm making more money, and I'm just a resource to be used or abused and paid for my time. At least the constant threat of a sudden termination is gone.
The thing is......staying relevant and impactful doesn't matter at Cisco. If you are in the wrong BU or Sales org at the wrong time...you are gone. And if you are over 40-50 yrs of age.....double target. HR person: you need to go to the lower levels meetings where politics are played with the LRs, and age discrimination is rampant.
Way to keep it classy, Memphis. Was only trying to share perspective...
@NlNFYNV-rpz. 50+?? You're next on the list then..Good ridance
Go fvck yourself.
@NlNFYNV-pey, Cisco HR and Cisco has spoken. Cisco employees don't deserve any respect or dignity. They don't care if you quit (actually they want employees to quit!)...
I AM in the HR organization...
...you alone are responsible for your career.
HR clearly isn't doing anything to maximize the utility of the company's human resources and yet they seem to feel "entitled" to a paycheck at the end of the week. Why is that?
When you sit in the same room with John Chambers and he announces to the room that he wants to see everyone RETIRE with Cisco, and then you go and do your part every single year to exceed your goals, and then you get whacked --- well, you are at least entitled to a bit of respect from the corporation you served when they tire of your 5 decades of existence. You would at least get a phone call from the firing manager, not just a group video execution; you would get fully paid for what you honestly earned....not just a mere % of it based on a random cutoff date.
Respect? Yes we are entitled to that.
I AM in the HR organization and I am NOT 30 -- 50+ with a mortgage, 3 kids in college and host of other obligations that you know nothing about. BUT I stand by my original statement. Have been through multiple companies in similar situations and the fact remains that you alone are responsible for your career. This LR stinks on a personal level, as it has countless times before -- at Cisco and at company __. But it is what it is. You have a choice. And we are not entitled to anything.
You form a relationship with your company.
When a company decides its people are not its biggest assets but merely an expense item on the balance sheet - that's when the inevitable train wreck takes place. And Cisco will wreck. No doubt about it.
You are too naive to believe the gibberish about business as usual. Maybe in Mcdonalds or assembly line workers, but the software field is a field of mentalics. By firing one person, you can quickly demoralize 100 people and your productivity will take a huge hit....BECAUSE YOU ARE HIRING PEOPLE's BRAINS AND MINDS which work the best when they are motivated. Unfortunately' Cisco brass never learnt this lesson.
Never mind that firing older workers and hiring cheap H1B/overseas is disgusting as well.
People do have a choice I agree, you can leave whenever you want.
However, Cisco portrays itself as family. The new people deal and all that manure employees get fed to make them feel part of something gets ripped away due to executive power plays, woeful mismanagement and spiteful local politics.
I was in the UK organisation for many years and I felt I was part of something important. Then I saw my friends getting bumped off one by one. I got to grade 11 and realised my only future in Cisco was taking risky jobs and either getting layed off or being a professional brown-noser.
Some people still have their blinkers on. Remove them and get out while you can! Good luck...
It undoubtedly is a reality among most large, established IT infrastructure vendors. Why would Cisco be not impacted? Look at the revenue...
Whether or not the LRs hits the right people or not is a different question, and having seen it in action I know for a fact it doesn't. But that's the way these things go down in corporate.
But look at it this way: Chambers for years stated that over 75% of companies in the Fortune 500 would fade within 10 years. The way things are going it is a distinct possibility Cisco may join the DECs, Suns and Nortels in high tech oblivion, which would mean those who reinvent themselves now will not sink with the ship.
Cisco has been good to me even though I feel my journey there has come to an end. There's little doubt in my mind this time around I shall be among those who leave, but after 16 years honestly what I need anyhow is some time off. And if Cisco closes its doors it will make me sad.
And to the executive team... They are trying to balance the old and the new. Other leaders would sell the existing core business to China in a hurry, and let them issue 8 week separation packages... It would be the brutal and easy thing to do. And it will inevitably happen, networking is no different from servers these days...
The original post was pretty ignorant. Spoken like someone who- 1) Doesn't have a family to feed 2) Doesn't have a mortgage to pay 3) Is young enough not to have to worry about age discrimination.
You may think you are young and untouchable now, but you too will be in your 50's someday, and you should have some sympathy for those who are getting the boot just based on their age.
I'm 30 and left Cisco when I was 27 because of the way they treat people as they get older. I wasn't in likely danger as a 30 yr old grade 10, but why would I stay at a company that rewards years of service and hard work with a pink slip? It just shows that it's not a company that values its employees.
Possibly the most disgusting post of the year.
The 'good ol boys club' is alive and well at Cisco, the amount of wasteful spending and incompetence has lead to 6 consecutive quarters of declining revenue. How many families should be impacted by this toxic culture before something changes? How many brain dead VPs will manipulate business value data to justify their job? How many people have no show jobs at Cisco?
26,000+ people impacted by layoffs since 2011
hark, a voice from HR. 4 Years out of school and you thought of this all by yourself? Cmon fess up, mommy helped didn't she