As a current SAS employee, I can tell you that the industry disruption is in fact affecting the company currently. Sales are down and there's a major hiring freeze currently.
With respect to the lack of layoffs, that can be attributed to our (including mine) salaries which are well below market. That certainly keeps salary expenditures low.
Great work life? I beg to differ. It depends on what org you are in. SAS doesnt allow work from on any regular basis because Goodnight has given us this wonderful campus...
So Ive been told. Yea... Half the buildings are so riddled with mold that I was constantly sick during my time there.
This review is based on my belief of how SAS operates, based on my experience working there.
Do not kid yourself. SAS lays people off. The method they use is quite unsavory. Rather than actually hold above-board "layoffs", they target specific people and subject them to "the treatment". Shunning, gaslighting, bullying, and other unprofessional tactics are employed. Imagine the worst junior high school clique you've ever dealt with, and magnify it 10x.
Targets receive extremely bizarre treatment and circumstances imposed by others, all intended to make them miserable and quit. Resilient targets who can withstand this treatment will find themselves in HR reviewing a list of trumped-up charges so ridiculous, they cannot be reasoned with or defended.
The employee has a choice at this point - take the money and run, or "improve performance" and "stay". It's a false choice. Those who "stay" are subjected to even more abuse and are usually fired within a short period of time and denied any payout.
This process is intended to protect the "No layoffs" myth. This is extremely destructive to those targeted. I believe the top guy himself encourages these practices to protect his saintly public image.
There are "layoffs". They just don't call them that.
Worse yet, the long-term dead weight employees pick the targets for this process. Competent, hard-working employees are destroyed and run out by the lazy and incompetent ones working to cover their tracks. Incompetent, dead-weight employees adept at dirty politics are what remains. All to protect one person's image. Really disgusting.
SAS will see the days of Nokia - it will become riirelevent in a year or two. only thing that keep SAS going is Dr. Jim Goodnight. Once he is out of sight, no one at the company know how to deal with the situation.
The SAS problem is the CEO doesn't want to lay people off because it would tarnish his reputation as someone who has never had mass layoffs. Does SAS need to lay people off? Hell yes. There is so much dead weight it keeps them competing in many markets. Is not laying people off sustainable? Probably not. SAS sales are super low, they haven't figured out cloud, and they bend over backwards to create unsustainable, custom solutions for their customers that overtime cost more to support than they actually bring in.
True
We pay less
We also do not lay off and we do have a great work life-balance if compared to others