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IBM layoffs strike first in India; workers describe as 'slaughter' and 'massive'

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Re: IBM layoffs strike first in India; workers describe as 'slaughter' and 'massive'

#61

Post by pekru »

TsomArp wrote: post #49
PakG1 wrote: post #46

I have perhaps a unique perspective on this, as I was part of IBM in Asia and left in November 2013. I witnessed the 2013 layoff action and witnessed many good people in Australia and Singapore laid off in the name of cost-cutting. It is mentioned in the article that for this 2014 round, people with even PBC 1 and 2 were fired, which would have been the top performing people on their teams. I worked as a project mana…

Sadly, I completely agree with you, and more specifically on the part about IBM going so low on the hiring process as to hire people that can not do their jobs. I would add that to add insult to injury, their level of english is terrible, to the point where many times you can not even understand what they are trying to say. This for both, India and China workers. Again, like you say, it is probably not the India and…

> Again, like you say, it is probably not the India and China people's fault,

> their level of english is terrible

Indians'/Chinese'

Re: IBM layoffs strike first in India; workers describe as 'slaughter' and 'massive'

#62

Post by PakG1 »

josefresco wrote: post #55
PakG1 wrote: post #46

I have perhaps a unique perspective on this, as I was part of IBM in Asia and left in November 2013. I witnessed the 2013 layoff action and witnessed many good people in Australia and Singapore laid off in the name of cost-cutting. It is mentioned in the article that for this 2014 round, people with even PBC 1 and 2 were fired, which would have been the top performing people on their teams. I worked as a project mana…

"Let's say that again: as of 2013, there were still hundreds of mission-critical IBM internal applications running on physical hardware until I was given the project to transition them to virtual servers." Is this so shocking or even wrong ? I would expect a company with the history and size of IBM to have tons of "old" hardware/processes. In fact it's that history, perceived wisdom and entrenchment that I would assu…

The reason why it wasn't nice was because of the complexity and inefficiency of maintenance. The senior managers who gave me this project wanted to move in that direction in 2010, but couldn't because again, they couldn't get the proper hardware in place in a timely fashion; just delay after delay. Then the Fukushima earthquake happened, which caused an emergency migration of applications from their Tokyo datacenter to their Baulkham Hills datacenter in Australia, which in turn used up all the capacity they were hoping to use for virtualizing everything.

It's not a bad thing if IBM wanted to stay on pure hardware for technical reasons (hey, virtualization can have performance hits, depending on the application). But even IBM didn't want to stay on pure hardware, and that's why it can be considered a sad thing that it took so long.

edit: clarification

Re: IBM layoffs strike first in India; workers describe as 'slaughter' and 'massive'

#63

Post by a3n »

PakG1 wrote: post #51
mjn wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the severance and extended benefits are far more generous than any layoff I've been through here in the states Interesting. Are big tech companies less generous than big engineering firms in other fields? When companies like BP, Boeing, etc. have had layoff rounds, 3 months is just about the minimum package for an involuntary termination, and it's common to first offer much higher voluntary packages to reduce headc…

When IBM did their layoff action in 2013, people in Australia received 2 weeks pay for every year they had worked at IBM. I was there, saw those people leave, saw what they got offered. Was really sad about it because one guy in particular was possibly the best project manager for our department in all of the Asia Pacific region. They gave the most critical projects to this guy. He worked hellish hours to get a sever…

> They gave the most critical projects to this guy. He worked hellish hours to get a severely important project done, ... When he came back, he got his 2 weeks pay per year worked.

And thus was the lesson learned by one more person. We are all, each and every one of us, hardware to be virtualized and eliminated as soon as possible.

We are all, each and every one of us, an expense to be minimized. You may get along great with your boss and co-workers, mutual admiration all around, and the people may be loyal to each other, and really mean it.

But when the animal that is the corporation decides it needs to eject you, you're ejected. It may even fall to those mutually loyal people that you worked with to eject you. And they'll feel bad. But it's not them making the decision, it's the corporate animal.

So do a good job, but go home at night and play with your kids, or dog, or S.O. Don't waste your life at work, because work doesn't care about you.

Re: IBM layoffs strike first in India; workers describe as 'slaughter' and 'massive'

#64

Post by cygwin98 »

PakG1 wrote: post #51
mjn wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the severance and extended benefits are far more generous than any layoff I've been through here in the states Interesting. Are big tech companies less generous than big engineering firms in other fields? When companies like BP, Boeing, etc. have had layoff rounds, 3 months is just about the minimum package for an involuntary termination, and it's common to first offer much higher voluntary packages to reduce headc…

When IBM did their layoff action in 2013, people in Australia received 2 weeks pay for every year they had worked at IBM. I was there, saw those people leave, saw what they got offered. Was really sad about it because one guy in particular was possibly the best project manager for our department in all of the Asia Pacific region. They gave the most critical projects to this guy. He worked hellish hours to get a sever…

Big corps like IBM share surprisingly similar traits as an military army. The general in charge of the army commonly only deals with the grand strategies and communicates with a few of his high-rank colonels. He has no idea who is the most skilled soldier or lieutenant, or captain. To him, they are only a number, a faceless expendable resource. Throughout the long history of wars, a lot of times low level heroic soldiers managed to win some battles but the army still lost the war simply due to the stupidity of the general.

Re: IBM layoffs strike first in India; workers describe as 'slaughter' and 'massive'

#65

Post by pekru »

arethuza wrote: post #6
smoyer wrote: post #5

I don't want to seem insensitive but ... The quote at the beginning of the article describes pretty much every layoff I've ever seen (or been through). The person quoted describes it as inhuman, but HR and managers are told to keep it impersonal (don't induce more crying than there is). You don't get notice (on purpose), you have to turn in company-owned property and they want you out the door (it affects the morale…

"Severance package was on an average 3 months basic component of salary, which is like 6 weeks full pay." That's not bad - probably more than most people would get here in the UK.

>> That's not bad - probably more than most people would get here in the UK.

It isn't a huge chunk of money in India, just decent enough to get by barely for a month, considering that much of these folks might be having loans/EMIs to pay for.

If the news (that thousands of Indian IBMers from STG losing a job) is for real, they would have a hard time indeed; since there isn't much of IBM-STG kinda stuff happening around (except for shops like redhat/intel/VMWare which might be interested in few folks with sysprog background). People who had entire careers built on and around AIX (not programming, but maintenance/config/admin etc) probably will have a really tough time. Managers, well, guess they just had it coming.

Re: IBM layoffs strike first in India; workers describe as 'slaughter' and 'massive'

#66

Post by CGudapati »

arethuza wrote: post #6
smoyer wrote: post #5

I don't want to seem insensitive but ... The quote at the beginning of the article describes pretty much every layoff I've ever seen (or been through). The person quoted describes it as inhuman, but HR and managers are told to keep it impersonal (don't induce more crying than there is). You don't get notice (on purpose), you have to turn in company-owned property and they want you out the door (it affects the morale…

"Severance package was on an average 3 months basic component of salary, which is like 6 weeks full pay." That's not bad - probably more than most people would get here in the UK.

Just to give a idea of how the salary structure works here. Suppose you are earning 50,000 per month, only 11,000 will be your basic, some 5000 will be your house rent. and another 5000 for some expenses and additional perks can be up to some 30000. So, they will earn only 11,000 pm instead of the 50,000. which won't even be sufficient to pay rent.

Re: IBM layoffs strike first in India; workers describe as 'slaughter' and 'massive'

#67

Post by jmsduran »

smackfu wrote: post #36
smoyer wrote: post #5

I don't want to seem insensitive but ... The quote at the beginning of the article describes pretty much every layoff I've ever seen (or been through). The person quoted describes it as inhuman, but HR and managers are told to keep it impersonal (don't induce more crying than there is). You don't get notice (on purpose), you have to turn in company-owned property and they want you out the door (it affects the morale…

>the severance and extended benefits are far more generous than any layoff I've been through here in the states. IBM is pretty generous with the severance in the US too. Something like a week's pay per 6 months worked, capped at 26 weeks. If you've been working there a while, that's a half year of salary. Plus there is generally a month notice, in theory so you can find another job internally.

Former IBM'er here. The reason IBM gives severance and extended benefits is not to look good, it's to prevent their employees from filing unlawful termination suits.

Second, there is a rumor in IBM that once an employee is marked as an RA (layoff), they are placed on an HR blacklist preventing them from finding another job internally. Departments that hire an employee placed on the RA blacklist are believed to have to layoff another employee to take their place.

Re: IBM layoffs strike first in India; workers describe as 'slaughter' and 'massive'

#68

Post by mkartic »

nailer wrote: post #40
dagw wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope jobs will re-emerge onshore later on. If by "onshore" you mean China, then you'll probably get your wish. Otherwise, probably not.

I've worked with 10 Indian employees that could easily be replaced with a single competent westerner (of any descent whatsoever) for 1/3 the price. I suspect I'm not alone.

Er, are you saying they were incompetent because they were Indians?

Re: IBM layoffs strike first in India; workers describe as 'slaughter' and 'massive'

#69

Post by dominotw »

ck2 wrote: post #50

Um, what is happening in Syria is a slaughter, literally. What is happening in India is mass layoffs, sad and unfortunate but "slaughter" ? When AOL and other US corporations outsourced all the call centers to India in 2000-2010 , there were mass layoffs here too.

Do you feel a sense of justice now?

Re: IBM layoffs strike first in India; workers describe as 'slaughter' and 'massive'

#70

Post by nailer »

mkartic wrote: post #68
nailer wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've worked with 10 Indian employees that could easily be replaced with a single competent westerner (of any descent whatsoever) for 1/3 the price. I suspect I'm not alone.

Er, are you saying they were incompetent because they were Indians?

>> a single competent westerner (of any descent whatsoever)

> are you saying they were incompetent because they were Indians?

Quite obviously not.

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