How many of us are finding it very difficult to celebrate the holidays? Everyone I know feels like they are waiting for the other shoe to drop. How do they think this is the right thing to do? So many employees worried about their jobs and their futures. It is difficult to find any peace through this experience and through the holidays.
ISD, Systems and possibly Ad Services? Who is left? Claims has been hit a few times in the last few years.
I am finding it difficult to celebrate the holidays, as the unknown is killing me.
My MGRs and DIR are leading us through the change exceptionally well IMO since they are impacted and facing what I will be as an anaylst first.
I have been told to focus on my resume and building my tech skills while I still have a job. "We are just numbers to this company, I will do everything I can to support you! In our outside the company" is what I hear from my leadership.
My wife is in a dept staying in BLM and I am in a dept slated to head to a hub. Homelife s---s right now!
The leadership I had was awful, completely clueless. I heard a lot of “I don’t know” from the leaders which killed my hopes within days of starting at SF.
I hated going to work at SF...every single day. Once the news of major changes starting coming out I left. I wasn’t there long enough for severance or anything. I did the skills assessment and then worked on leaving. Now I am at a job the fully utilizes my skills and provides relevant training without forcing people to get garbage insurance designations first. Leadership at my new job is fantastic and its an amazing feeling being excited to go into work, working with a great team and actually accomplishing things.
Pretty soon they're going to run out of shoes. This is ridiculous! Agree with the "rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic" comment. State Farm has no strategy! Period. Cost-cutting and using buzzwords is not a strategy, it's a sign of desperation and cluelessness.
I guess we've always known that State Farm's management structure had too many layers, and as a result, the people at the top of Systems truly had very little idea what went on in the trenches. This problem was apparent to me when I first started (17 years ago), but until CDE, I never realized how utterly clueless Systems leadership was.
I still have a hard time understanding how anyone could think it was a good idea to change practically everything about Systems simultaneously (the technology stack, the department structure, the technical leaders, the process, the desks, the rooms, the vendors, etc etc.) I mean, that nonsense was doomed to fail.
The bedbug infestation was a nice touch.
I often wonder if the people at the top realize what a debacle CDE/ICP was, or if they merely view complaints like mine as evidence that things COULD HAVE WORKED if they'd only gotten rid of the right people.
I don't suppose it matters. State Farm as a company is sliding downhill, and Systems is sliding with it.
It's sad to see what's become of the place.
For what it’s worth everyone I know who has left State Farm has landed on their feet. It’s disappointing and a great inconvenience, but in spite of lackluster leadership the last few years most employees at some point were provided with training leaving them with marketable skills desirable for many companies.
It’s been sad living the decline of the company after many many years of working there. Who knows what’ll be left after theses execs get through letting consultants decide the next direction. Seems like rearranging deck chairs on the titanic at this point.
All this appears to be about head count.
Good luck to all. My department will be impacted, again, soon. And I too will be leaving.
I was cut when the first shoe dropped. I feel much better now than I did when things were so uncertain -- the not knowing was killing me. After I found out I was cut -- and later, when I finally decided not to relocate to secure another job with the Farm -- a sense of peace settled over me.
I'm sticking around for the severance, but after that, I have no idea what will happen. And THAT feels a lot better than not knowing whether the Farm was going to cut me. I can't really explain the psychology of that, except to say that I feel like I'm in control now (to the extent that anyone is ever really in control of their career), whereas before I felt like the Farm was batting be around like a cat with a ball of yarn.