I don't think there is anybody left at Juniper who is here because they want to be. I think the only employees working here are those who haven't been able to find a replacement job yet. At least I haven't run into anybody who is not looking in a long time.
Unless some serious changes are made, this might turn into a real problem for the company sooner than leadership might expect...
@YiWTfjU-9ozr Reward an employee's loyalty?
I don't think you'll see that anywhere at any company.
Juniper has had a larger than usual number of DEs/PEs leave in the past 2 years. These guys don't worry about layoffs and leave when they see a problem with the company. It will be difficult to replace these talented folks. Having come from the Netscreen acquisition I was with Juniper for 14 years before getting let go. I really started to see the decline with leadership and strategy with the previous and current CEO. I won't even get into the SRX losses with big providers, cable providers in the past few years. Juniper used to be the admired placed to work for even ahead of Cisco. Now it's the opposite and Cisco has reinvented itself. Several former colleagues told me Cisco encourage mobility within the company so even if you work on a terrible project or for a nasty boss, you have the opportunity to jump to a different group. I still have many good friends left at Juniper and I wish them well. Juniper leadership, if you are reading: stop doing these regular and stealth layoffs, stop replacing senior folks with cheaper "freshers" in Bangalore, raise up new and better leadership at the executive level even if it means bringing in a new CEO from the outside. Reward those who have stuck with the company through the thick and thin, and provide better severance packages for folks in the US. Maybe if you demonstrate some loyalty to your employees then you'll get some of the same loyalty back.
There's a lot of truth to this.
I meet people very, very regularly who have left Juniper the past year. Everyone is very jovial with their new companies and they don't hold back about how they felt at Juniper.
@YiWTfjU-1amz Very good points. Nobody will lift a pinky if they are under constant threat of being fired in months time. Most will leave the office at 5 or earlier if they can get away with it.
From what I've read, Apple was like this until a strong personality titan like Steve Jobs rejoined and terraformed the place culturally and product-wise. Unfortunately, such caped heroes are too far and few to dive into struggling companies unless they have some personal vested interest, like Jobs did with his baby Apple.
I am in group of "totally resigned to eventually being fired" ... it seems like in almost every meeting I am in lately, we identify a gap to move a project along, and the next words out of someone's mouth is "well the person who used to do that for us isn't here anymore and there's no backfill so..." Morale is low enough that no one takes on even more responsibility to fill the gap, because why should we kill ourselves just to cover over bad decisions by leadership? Layoffs should mean projects get dropped or deprioritized when there's not enough people to do them...but that of course doesn't happen. I'm still here because I feel like I am doing good by bailing water on this sinking ship as much as possible.
I think it's unfair to say everybody is leaving. This is anectodal.
That said, I think the quarterly layoffs & stealth layoffs to stay under California's advertised WARN system has been extremely detrimental to morale. The danger is losing the ballers who keep the company's fortunes alive. These people have reputation and in my experience a good amount of these people have left in the last 1-2 yrs. This brain drain is extremely difficult to replace in a timely manner of company transition. It's exponential.
Current quarterly layoffs have created for a worker two view points. One is to be totally resigned to eventually being fired, but mentally prepared for it as they have enough savings, have a working spouse for support, near retirement anyways, have Visa issues so they must stay, or too naive to know the scope of layoffs to be too worried about it. The other group are keyed into the scope of layoffs, are stressed, and are looking. I'd say my anectodal evidence is 75% the former/25% the later. Juniper is still not even close to a "run for the hills" type of environment as Theranos or Enron was. Heck, Oracle is having huge layoffs this year and they're much more stressed--go read that board or news articles!
I think everybody at Juniper IS(!) employable and if you're an SDE even more so, as their skills are in so much demand and can easily get a job at a FANG with proper prep training. I think with time, any J employee can find something better regardless of background. Juniper has always hired people with sterling resumes, so background isn't a detriment. It's TIME(!)--trying to time a transition early enough before the hammer falls. In Silicon Valley area, jobs are plenty--but you still need time! I think it would be much more dire to be in EMEA as these regions are headed into recession this quarter. There is no reason why anyone in EMEA who's looking shouldn't double down and be looking hard, before companies over there batten down the hatches!
My only advice is that you guys create a 12+ month savings plan. This eases stress immensely! So if you ain't there yet, start saving!
All I can tell you is that people who have left for a better environment are in another universe of happy. I guess when one gets beaten down so much morale-wise, one thinks that's the normal way of things and fails to understand what IS possible elsewhere. Being in a highly perceived growing company is a game changer to your soul!! For me, I slogged it out prepping and benefited immensely. You can too, if you're not lazy about it!
I wish you all the best of luck whatever path you choose and I pray that J gets its house in order for the benefit of its people (it can still happen)!
Anyone at Juniper EMEA who i still around is because they have no where else to go and are NOT employable. I know someone, he is just a politician. Waiting for people to go so that he can get a grade up. Vultures and parasites. Thing is, upper management knows about these people but does nothing because parasites want more parasites around them so that they can all have a feeding frenzy on the carcass of the beast that once was Juniper
Anyone still at juniper has a higher likelihood of getting layed off, than getting laid.
At least those in service greater than 10 years...most prolly they are waiting for separation scheme packages...