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Microsoft Looks to Cut Up to 18,000 Jobs

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Re: Microsoft Looks to Cut Up to 18,000 Jobs

#141

Post by Infinitesimus »

shaydoc wrote: post #29
Infinitesimus wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Layoffs aren't always about profit though. In this case, it is more about streamlining and making MS more agile

How does laying off 18,000 people make you more "agile" ? Products that sell make you more "agile"... Its more a case of, we bought Nokia for their market, but we don't need their staff!

What I mean is fewer layers in the org chart and fewer people to pass decisions through/get approvals from could result in faster product changes. Not necessarily better changes of course, but there is the potential for quicker iteration

Re: Microsoft Looks to Cut Up to 18,000 Jobs

#142

Post by at-fates-hands »

roc wrote: post #106
untog wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there any large acquisition that succeeded in the last 10 years? You might have the wrong criteria for acquisition success. I'm sure both Nokia and MS knew these layoffs would come before they agreed to the purchase.

I'm sure Nokia itself knew these layoffs were likely-to-inevitable whether that deal happened or not.

If that was the case, do you think most of the Nokia employees were actively looking for another job and were just riding the gravy train until it finally pulled into the station?

I would think if I worked at Nokia and we were acquired by Microsoft, I'd probably be looking for another job fairly quickly. Considering the writing was on the wall for a while even before they were acquired by MS.

Re: Microsoft Looks to Cut Up to 18,000 Jobs

#143

Post by HNJohnC »

NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #89
pxlpshr wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of writing "Christ", you should consider posting an email as if you were the one newly responsible for a $364B company and a reduction in 18,000 jobs. I'd be curious to see other people's management style from their armchair.

Subject: Important Company-wide Announcement Dear Employees, For our business to continue running, we must reduce the number of staff. This is an unfortunate but also inevitable reality. [insert details of layoff here] [insert honest platitudes] Senior management wishes all of you the best of luck, and has every confidence that you will be even more successful at your next job.

Yup, in this day and age simplicity and clarity stand out and are appreciated by most people.

Re: Microsoft Looks to Cut Up to 18,000 Jobs

#144

Post by mikeryan »

cookiecaper wrote: post #119
untog wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have an MBA. I've just worked with people who were both gifted and in possession of an MBA. The presumption that people won't 'get it' because they have an MBA is laughable.

It's a social indicator, not a definitive attribute. I've known several MBAs personally and only one was legitimately intelligent -- the rest were sales guys who thought their MBA entitled them to make big decisions with perilously little background or knowledge of much of anything related to the situation. I know an MBA right now who is pursuing a business wherein he offers wifi hotspots to small businesses. His lit…

I know a guy with an MBA who runs a successful interactive agency thats had 100% revenue growth year over year. His MBA has better trained him to handle the operations, accounting and marketing side of his business, since up to the point of starting his company he'd only worked as a software engineer.

YMMV.

Re: Microsoft Looks to Cut Up to 18,000 Jobs

#146

Post by nilkn »

sz4kerto wrote: post #24
rayiner wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's plausible, but also plausible is that the drawn-out process causes the better performers to leave while they can. It's easy to say from the outside that the layoffs will hit underperformers and people who are just coasting, but the fact is that layoffs of this scale inevitably involve politics. We're talking about an organization that had so much trouble getting the Office people on the same page as the Mobile…

> That's plausible, but if I were at Microsoft I'd be sending out my resume right now. No -- most people who work at a big company know _exactly_ whether they're in danger or not. We're speaking about 5% of the original (pre-Nokia acquisition) workforce. You must know whether you're in the bottom 5%, or if your product is in the least critical 5%. Of course there are surprises and some good/productive guys will be la…

I think you overlooked his point, which is that corporate politicking inevitably means that it's not just the bottom 5% that will get laid off.

Also, I disagree with your assumption that it's easy to know if you're in the bottom 5% of performers. Of course you will have a general idea of where you stand, but in a company the size of Microsoft with considerable organization dysfunction I really doubt anybody can judge themselves with that sort of granularity.

Re: Microsoft Looks to Cut Up to 18,000 Jobs

#147

Post by kyrra »

incision wrote: post #135
pierreio wrote: post #94

So MS Bought Nokia and ~30k employees for ~$7.2 billion last April. 3 months later, MS may now be firing ~half of the Nokia group. The executives who drove that catastrophic deal stay. What a testament to how disastrous big M&A really is. Is there any large acquisition that succeeded in the last 10 years? I'd feel sorry if I was a Nokia guy there, they pulled out the best non-Apple phone hardware in the last years. P…

>'So MS Bought Nokia and ~30k employees for ~$7.2 billion last April. 3 months later, MS may now be firing ~half of the Nokia group. The executives who drove that catastrophic deal stay.' My understanding, primarily from friends at Cisco which has its own history of acquisitions and layoffs is that this is roughly standard procedure, catastrophe or not. Basically, there's always going to be a lot of overlap when acqu…

Cisco does buy a lot of companies, but only about as many as google has bought. Though Cisco has has more billion $ or higher deals.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_acquisitions_by_Cisco_S...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mergers_and_acquisition...

Re: Microsoft Looks to Cut Up to 18,000 Jobs

#148

Post by mynewwork »

aikah wrote: post #82
kabdib wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stock is up over 45 now . . . Getting rid of dead wood is a great idea. Tons of middle management there, just sitting for years and causing obstructive damage.

> Tons of middle management there, just sitting for years and causing obstructive damage. how do you know it's middle management? > Getting rid of dead wood That's such a despicable way to talk about human beings,but not surprising here,unfortunatly.

Oh come on. Referring to unproductive jobs as dead wood is a perfectly fine idiom.

Nobody is implying the people who hold those jobs have any personal failings or aren't capable of doing productive work, but the jobs themselves are not helping the business.

Re: Microsoft Looks to Cut Up to 18,000 Jobs

#149

Post by ww520 »

outside1234 wrote: post #131
k2enemy wrote: post #3

And now, every day for a year, everyone gets to wake up and wonder if this is the day that they will get laid off. Why can't they wait and make the announcement once they know who they will eliminate and do it in one swift action? Why put people in limbo for a year?

Microsoft employee here: I took this exactly the opposite way. I know I'm valuable, I know many others aren't (sorry: being honest) and this is a good thing from my perspective because at Microsoft we are finally facing reality and getting the right people in place. My only gripe is that the layoffs are not larger - we need about 20% of the marketing folks and 20% of the program managers that we currently have. I wou…

Letting 80% marketing and PM go? Wow. I thought PM are pretty good in Microsoft.

Re: Microsoft Looks to Cut Up to 18,000 Jobs

#150

Post by sirkneeland »

pierreio wrote: post #94

So MS Bought Nokia and ~30k employees for ~$7.2 billion last April. 3 months later, MS may now be firing ~half of the Nokia group. The executives who drove that catastrophic deal stay. What a testament to how disastrous big M&A really is. Is there any large acquisition that succeeded in the last 10 years? I'd feel sorry if I was a Nokia guy there, they pulled out the best non-Apple phone hardware in the last years. P…

While I am no fan of the deal (to say the least), Nokia would have had to make these deep cuts independently based on the continued inability of Windows Phone to sell enough to support a company of Nokia's size.
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