Thread regarding Fidelity Investments layoffs

The squad lead makes sense. There were multiple teams where the project management was tossed over to the engineering side. It's unfortunate because I know there were a few great squad leads, but that was not the norm.

@OP "VP-level Squad Leaders overseeing non-prioritized projects, small teams, or any L8 Individual Contributors are at risk of layoffs"

It is sad when a company is so big that it cannot make an effort to differentiate between a performer vs a non-performer and cuts people just based on roles/levels etc.

In the past, they made efforts to put people in other groups/roles. I hear that's not part of the plan this time. Sad!

how does a demotion like that even work

only seen 1 demotion in my career at fidelity and it was because the guy sc--wed up bigly

@bb which roles were demoted and when? What BU? Was it part of a reorg or just performance? All these years here and I have never seen what we are talking about via a massive reorg like this.

Maybe you just have poor performers around you

@bm are you saying that all of the scrum masters that were forced into the role, but used to be project managers, are safe?

@ay In many BUs the squad leader roles were not doing the job of product prioritization or product leadership - they were simply saying yes to everyone who asked their team to do something. Because there was no training or accountability applied to the squad leader roles many of the folks in those positions are considered “overhead” - and when you are “overhead” you are very cuttable.

This is why the GSL role is also getting eliminated - they were supposed to bring discipline into the product space and it didn’t happen. So they are targeted as well.

Scrum Masters that don’t have any project management skills and have not displayed the ability to hold their teams accountable for actual delivery and prioritization are being let go as well.

There will be some squad leaders - that came from technical backgrounds and have a history of displaying technical expertise that will be kept, but they will be expected to be people leaders as well.

@ak what do you mean by “that never happened”? Demotion happened to multiple people around me, within and outside of my organization throughout the years. You don’t know it doesn’t mean it never happened

@ak, why not? the GSL refuse to be demoted? Lay them off then.

@at
Why squad leads job at risk?

Agile is dead at the firm. The Spotify method of agile is going away and fast. Scrum related jobs probably on the block as well as squad leads

No way they end up having product L8s reduced to L7s report to engineering.

Look at the group in wealth that have engineering leaders. That never happened.

Even reduction or demoting someone never happened then. But I have no idea if it will happen now. What I do know is that they won’t have a L8 GSL report to engineering.

@a3 I am guessing individual contributors

Non-leadership roles will see minimal reductions, but still possible What does non-leadership mean?

@OP thanks that’s very concise s c useful.