It's hard to verify when people hear bits and pieces of a conversation. Leadership has outright lied to us or lied through omission for easily, the past 5 years. With the advent of Amazon, WM has been fighting a losing battle throwing blind, drunken punches hoping some will strike and knock Amazon back. You can smell the desperation of WM.
This wasn't always the case. At one time we were kept in the loop. Now they don't even listen to their associates (who used to have the best ideas) while the HO makes all the decisions whether they will work or not. in fact, the HO has always made their decisions in a bubble.
I left a year ago of my own volition. I saw the writing on the wall. I worked for the HO. Every time there was a huge layoff, we would have an all-hands meeting. Leadership would tell us that there would be no more layoffs. Guess what? A few weeks later, another round of layoffs. And then another meeting. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. Ad nauseum. Associates were walking around like zombies with survivor guilt. Not knowing when they would get that mysterious meeting notice in the middle of the night waiting for you in the morning. All it said was to report to a certain room at a certain time. It was almost a sigh of relief knowing you didn't have to work in that toxic environment. But a new kind of stress took over about how to take care of your family.
WM was too busy looking at the finish line celebrating first place when Amazon quietly sneaked up behind them and surpassed them for that first place position. WM doesn't know what to do except panic and buy companies to even compete.
At this point, I would believe any rumor on this site than anything that came out of a SM, CM or management from the HO. They have become a pack of liars.