I can't understand the logic the leadership is using to choose who stays and who goes. They've let some really skilled people go recently for no clear reason. Some newer folks as well, who joined maybe a year or so ago. Their decisions just seem completely random.
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It’s all political and leaders get kudos for reducing cost. Easy to target long term older skilled employees. And now the trend is to eliminate through performance reviews which are very subjective. It’s all about who you know at the end of the day.
Perfect. You've nailed the entire vicious cycle. Let me frame it with the specific flavor we all recognize:
"Bhai, exactly! You've described the whole nautanki (drama). It starts with a 'transformation' that's just a PowerPoint slide for the board. Some new CIO comes in, gets a big budget, and declares, 'Ab hum sab Pluralsight karenge!' It's a checkbox. A 'Culture' checkbox.
They think sending 5000 developers a link to a 'What is Agile?' video is the same as changing 20 years of sarkari (bureaucratic) mindset. The old bade sahab (big boss) managers nod in the meeting, then go back and bully their teams to deliver the same old waterfall deadlines and do the 'agile ceremonies'. Double the work, zero the trust.
The people who actually learned, who asked 'But how does this work with our on-prem Jenkins?' or 'Shouldn't the business team be in this sprint planning?' — they became the problem. Because they highlighted the gap between the fancy talk and the ground reality. They created friction. And in a 'Yes, Sir' culture, friction is a fireable offense.
So the layoffs aren't random. They are a culture cleanup. They are removing the antibodies that were fighting the infection of stupidity. They don't want skilled people who will say 'This vendor lock-in with OpenShift will cost crores and we can't even debug it.' They want people who will say 'Ji, Haan, Sir. Ticket raise kar diya hai vendor ko.' and wait for 2 weeks.
You invest in Pluralsight for learning, then fire the learners. This is the ultimate Indian IT paradox. They want the label of a modern tech company without the guts of one. They are cutting off the nose (the talented, questioning people) to spite the face (the company's future). All to preserve the comfort of command-and-control.
It makes no business sense, but it makes all the empire-saving sense in the world. Terrible for the company, but for the bade log (top people) sitting in their cabins, it's 'doing the needful' to keep their authority. Sad, but true."
The ironic thing is that what you're describing absolutely IS discrimination. Throwing in some young people to make sure you don't get sued is discrimination against the young. Of course, that's not technically the illegal type of age discrimination, so here we are. It's still a total load of cr-p.
@av yep, I am 55 and was with wells for 32 years. Got cut in August along with others who were in their 50’s with 10+ years at Wells.
@ma Any place to get the handbook if one was recently terminated?
There are several factors that are considered.
If you are laying off a large population, it goes into a randomizer and then spits out names to ensure fairness. It actually favors those that have been here a while. I'm not sure the weighting of that though, so it's likely you will have a mix of those that have been here a long time and those that haven't. By LAW, they have to tell you ages (not names) of those also laid off to prove non-discrimination. The randomizer is only used when you are cutting more folks than for a reason like workforce location strategy.
This year thhere is a bigger focus on non-performers (which also includes those not consistently adhering to in-office policies), but they will be term'd for cause, meaning no severance.
Folks, you have to keep in mind. If you are in an at will state, you can get let go for any reason at any time. And severance is severance as laid out in the handbook/policy, which everyone has access to. It cannot be negotiated (unless you are a certain exec level and it's part of your contract). Right now it's two weeks for every year, capped at a year. Minimum is 8 weeks, so even if you just got hired a month ago, you would get 8 weeks severance.
I encourage everyone to read your benefits book, employee handbook, and any related policies. Access is not restricted. If you are an employee, you have access.
The only rhyme or reason for the layoffs is so Chuck can fill the roles with offshore employees or JP Morgan employees.
Its not a firm, quit calling it a firm. It's a bank and bas been the 20yrs I've been here. No clue where this started. Likely from Scarf and his restructuring or relocation push to the east coast. Bottom line, you can try and fancy it up for wallstreet, but a pig in lipstick, is still a pig.
Incredible that any evidence to the contrary is actually more evidence of the conspiracy!
@dg Sounds right. in your example, late 60s dude probably makes less salary than you and other mid-50s person who were shown the door. Or late 60s dude is protected by managers for now.
Definitely target 55 plus. Watch out if moved from one team to another team and management also changes your job title. Setting you up to be the first to get cut esp if your salary range is higher than others in new team, even if someone else is older than you. (thats why you were moved to new team.) As others have said they sprinkle in a few under 40 sacrificial lambs to make it look like theres no age discrimination. It's all a shell game, slight of hand, to save people they want to keep. good performance rarely impacts decisions.
YES! They made it a point to cover themselves to list all the age on the team to show they weren't being agist. they me and another mid-50's guy go, but pointed out the late 60's guy got to stay.
@cg+1kck7nx1n You mean Charles Montgomery Burns Ebenezer Scrooge Scharf a despicable character!
Do not forget people targeted on fake performance reviews to be terminated with no severance!!! Im 62 and happened to me Dec 2nd. From what I have seen here and Red it I am not alone. Despicable!!
It not making sense is a FEATURE. They want max confusion and anger about it, because that is most likely to lead to the most voluntary resignations. That's all that matters.
I won't make a stereotype about Charlie, but I have yet to see him add value to the firm. He iis just current costs, not creating products and services. There's no point in keeping the firm afloat with the damage it has done to clients. Shut it down....break it up and fire that human wrecking ball.
Just look at the latest Corp Risk email. All his cronies are moved around to get new reports so they don’t get let go. It’s not age or pay, it’s who you know and who you *low not what you know. They are keeping inflated salaries and getting rid of low-mid salaries and shipping them off to India or the Philippines.
One director told us AI picked these people, but refused to share who wrote the prompt or what was the prompt.
@ax - They provided a list of those let go with me, and most were over 40.. a few sprinkled in were under 40.
They have to create a mix of older workers and younger workers so they don’t get sued for age bias. If you are over 55 and have ever been laid off you get an extra document to show the age disbursement to make it seem like you were not targeted. The other factor is the old boys network, if you are liked, you may stay. Then it’s ratings and or sc--w ups. So they can argue cause if necessary. But make no mistakes, they already reassigned folks they want to keep and good luck being directly placed in an open role .
With how old some corners of this place are, of course layoffs are also going to skew old. High earners will also skew old and be an obvious target for cost-cutting. Not rocket science.
based on what i've seen and experienced, they are targeting older workers first, then those who are remote, then those with medical accommodations. they throw in a random couple of "younger" folks just to CYA on the age discrimination. and im not a boomer so whoever the boomer-hater(s) on this thread can eat a snickers. boomers are being targeted, no doubt.
Someone who isn't a boomer laid off? Uh....it's all part of the anti-boomer conspiracy, you see. That's how threatened they are by all that institutional knowledge.
@aw
Yep, and your manager won't know who gets whacked until they pull the trigger. They can provide some names, bit that is it. Makes it real hard when your team is already whacked down to nothing.
@ax
Gotta keep up appearances. This isn't a problem as these are the easier choices to make. You can backfill easier if need be.
@av
Yep, and I now am one of them.
They also need to throw in some young "sacrifices" to keep the age levels level to avoid age discrimination. Which may make it seem random, but it really isn't.
The Director in your area is the one making the decisions. They discreetly ask the POs, SMs, MGRs about your performance. If there is hesitation, you get picked.
If you're making more money than your peers, if you are older than 50 and have been here for 10 + years, you're definitely a target .
The formula probably includes age / years of service / pay / location / position...
Basically, everyone can be targeted even using age discrimination.