As someone who is currently wrapping up an internship this whole layoff situation is terrifying
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No early career professional should even consider staying at Cisco long term. Cisco doesn't innovate and is a case study in mismanagement at every level. You'll learn nothing except how to be a PowerPoint artist, how to micromanage entry-level contractors and how to s--- up to executive management to protect yourself. Save yourself and your career and get out now!
Wait until you have responsibilities like a family, mortgage, etc to support. Then it'll be a lot of fun!
If you want an easier life, go and find a job where tech assists a real business, rather than BE the business. And make sure you cannot get off-shored by staying relevant to the business.
As a long time, soon to be ex employee, my advice to any intern is run don't walk to other companies to look for a full time position. Be positive n the interviews. When asked about you Cisco experience, tell them it was a great learning experience, but it wasn't a cultural fit for you. For bonus points if you know, some already working at the other company, or who interned there say something like, "my friend worked/works there and told me that at ..... you .... That's what I'm looking for".
Whatever you do don't be stupid. Don't even consider converting to full time at Cisco.
"There's Never Been a Better Time to get Fired". #NeverBetter. Then again, I'm Rick Harrison, and this is my pawn shop. I work here with my old man and my son, Big Hoss. Everything in here has a story and a price. One thing I've learned after 21 years - you never know what is gonna come through that door.
I was in your shoes once. Super stoked to have my internship, then eventually turned full-time. 7 years in a row of layoffs and I just lost my stomach for it. What you'll see in this coming sweep is that the layoffs are political, racial and personal. Very few if any will be based on actual performance.
It sounds over the top, but ask around to any of the survivors of the past decade. Even the most optimistic "yay equality, love everybody" people will agree.
Best of luck youngster, just remember if you do work at Cisco.. the health center on campus is ALWAYS well stocked with blood pressure, depression, anxiety and sleep medications. At some point you'll likely end up trying them all, if not all at once.
they better announce it in earnings call, full and final so that survivors can get back to live,work and play and affected have clarity. the worst thing is a extended trickle 'stealth' LR over months (well not so stealthy now)..because nobody wants to work in such a environment
This is the best place to live, work, and play
Welcome to Cisco! Seriously, if you can't stomach these Big Bang style layoffs, you should not work at an enterprise technology company like Cisco, IBM, HP, VMWare or others. You need to either work in the real Valley of startups or for a tier 1 tech giant like Apple or Google. It pains me to say it, but Cisco has not been tier 1 since the dot com crash followed by Chambers ruining engineering. At least we survived, could have been worse. Could have been Sun.
welcome to the reality dear intern.