Thread regarding Cengage layoffs

Get out as fast as you can. I had an id–t manager who had no idea what I do everyday. It was embarrassing to explain to her/him my duties. I fed up and left for a better world outside of Cengage.

@11EY9SX9-1pvg I think this person is saying that others do this. Trust me, I worked in an area where people did the same thing, and it was the exception to the rule with these people. There are a bunch of lazy id–ts who are screwing everyone and, unfortunately, they are never targeted. Someone once said competence is a curse. They show none so slide under the radar time after time.

@11EY9SX9-dxr so many forward-thinking employees in content were let go or quit because they got sick of things. I was one of them who wanted desperately to think outside the box and come up with newer, better ways to do things. I was let go because my team was large and someone (director) didn't like me or perceived me as something I wasn't. I got more exceeds than mets on my evaluations yet I was axed. SO many who are still there I think, really? You've survived all these layoffs when you don't want to do any work, think of newer ways to do things, or hide behind others. Those are the people they are left with, unfortunately, and it's not a starring lineup.

@11EY9SX9-gsz, OMG, yes to the "why is this publishing company trying to be a tech company?" question. We used to say all the time the in-house tech team should be addressing the hundreds of bugs in the online products, not building products. I used an offshore company to build my product at a fraction of the cost in months as compared to the years it was taking to migrate data to the Prime replacement!

To anyone who has gotten cut from Cengage or is about too...life is so much better on the other side. I’m in a different (growing) industry, make more money and my contributions are valued far more than they were at Cengage. Get out of Ed publishing entirely and find out there are companies that value your skills and experience

Dang... I have been gone from Cengage for several years but still have many colleagues that still work there. It's a shame to see what has come from, what used to be, a fabulous place to work. Great people, great products, and a great industry. So many things have changed since then (really starting from when Cengage became Cengage) that it's a shame to see the downward spiral continue. All for-profit publishers, in general, have latched on to this propaganda that their mission is to save students money. It's complete nonsense and the furthest thing from the truth. Good luck to all those still there, and I hope it all works out for you over these next several weeks.

I'll see you guys on LinkedIn.

@11EY9SX9-2yrw I am the author of the overly-long confessional below. I thought I was finished sharing my experience within Hanson's version of Cengage until I read your post just below this one.

YES - it was that same Ohio-based middle-manager who was my Friday phone call torture master. I am a mature, rational human being and more than capable of removing emotion from professional-side matters, but I will admit that I grew to hate that gentleman. He was the most nasty, negative-minded person sitting in a leadership position I have ever encountered. No doubt the Shark - the Director of Sales - was pulling the strings and making the decisions, but his Ohio-based whipping boy did the deeds. It was almost as if they spent their time dreaming up new ways to torture me into quitting – all to save the company, what? Twenty thousand dollars a year?

I promise you they lost several times that amount in the years since my departure - I visit the same schools now that I did with Cengage and walking the Bookstore shelves - almost all of my hard-won business is long gone. Lost to competitors (me included - wink).

It was only after my departure that I learned that I was one of several being tortured in this way. They wanted to get rid of all longer-standing people, and they had been playing the same Friday Phone Call game with each of those other targets, too.

This is the dark underbelly that does not get mentioned in Glassdoor reviews. With Cengage, you have the feel-good CEO actually shoveling the Kool-Aid out to the internal masses, but then you have this really nasty, multi-layered management system below him whose actions are in direct odds with the CEO messaging. The Shark found himself beached some time ago and I look forward to the day that Mister Ohio finds himself in similar circumstance.

It is all so ... unnecessary.

And all of it at odds with selling content and gaining marketshare. It is no wonder Cengage is imploding in this way, they took their eye off the ball years and years ago.

@11EY9SX9-2zrv thank you for sharing your story. I too was there during that time of the CEO's inaugural start–this was right after another reorg by the previous regime. It was a confusing time as people were coming and going, morale was in the toilet, no leadership, and working 12 hour days as one could not get any support. What made it worse was the fakeness of all the individuals who made coming to work become a real life reality show "Survivor"–Outplay, Outwit, Outlast! People you known for years all of sudden began politicking with the new former pearson folks, the kool aid was flowing everywhere, and the meetings all of a sudden became teenager parties where folks are doing selfies, videos, expensive team bonding events. It created the culture of what is it today. Leadership looked the other way because in their eyes they were brainwashing the organization to buy in to the "Be your own CEO", Engaging this/that, white glove service BS, etc. It made it very awkward as instead of focusing on driving sales, many felt they had to play the game to in order to fight for their jobs or establish their reputation with the new guard. Folks reading this know who they are and should be ashamed they made coming to work a stressful and unprofessional environment.

So my addition to this thread is redundant–but yes, management is another cause to the fall of this company. I'm calling out the CEO as well and want to emphasize the chaos the NSM and his director of sales have caused. The director of sales is the middle management...they manage managers who manage the district managers. One particular one who lives in Ohio was the worst of them all. At Presidents Club, he showed up intoxicated at the formal dinner where many executive dignitaries were present. Not only intoxicated but was in his swimtrunks he wore all day and no shirt...sat at dinner with a towel draped across him. The NSM had to tell him to go back to his room like a 9 year old to change which he didn't. This director was also popular with many of the female reps as well. He over the years has missed goal, created constant turnover, and was far from a leader. Sadly there were 3 other Director of sales and this middle layer of management held no one accountable, created a toxic environment, and created an atmosphere of games which caused chaos and lack of focus.

I'm glad the poster found happiness and a rewarding career at their new place of environment. Many left this dumpster fire long ago and I'm sure are better off. If you get laid off in November, your life will move on from this disaster and count yourself lucky. We all get our number called no matter how long the track record of success or how popular you think you are with management.

For the person posting beneath me, I want to say it's a terrible awful story and does not surprise me. This attitude that cengage employees are filth that need to be manipulated and lied to starts at the top and trickles down to the DM's who lap it up like mangy curs. You and I are both gone from Cengage but make no mistake it is a cult headed by evil heartless souls with only one ambition: The worship of money and they're not interested in supporting everyone and increasing the profitability of the entire organization. Oh no... they are interested in fleecing everyone else to save themselves and they will lie, steal, cheat and manipulate to get what they want regardless of the torment they cause everyone else around them. We all see it for what it is, but like I said even lowly sub intelligent folks like DM's lap it up, these guys are their heroes and they're just their little minions in waiting for their chance to fleece everyone beneath them. Good riddance Cengage.

It was then I decided I should look for new work. Instead, they fired me.

I got the call on - wait for it - a Friday afternoon. This time from a different middle-manager, someone I had never met. HR was on the line, it was a typical "we're letting you go" kind of call. When I asked why I was being released, the mid-manager began to stammer and say "uh . . . uh . . . uh" repeatedly and finally said "I cannot reveal that, it is confidential." "How can it be confidential, I'm the employee!" I responded. In response, I got some mumbo-jumbo about having to "consult with legal" before telling me the reason behind my dismissal, followed by the management scum asking "am I done here?" of the HR representative, who released the manager from the call.

It was the most bizarre thing I'd ever been through. I'll spare you the rest of the Cengage-side story (everything went in my favor) but as it happened, I had fielded an interest inquiry from a competitor about a week prior to all of this, and shortly after hanging up with the Cengage people I initiated what turned out to be a winning relationship with the competitor.

Why do I bother relating this lengthy story to you? Because of what I learned after-the-fact. . .

I had taken all of the above twists and turns quite personally. I didn't understand why, but all I knew is that for some reason Cengage leadership no longer wanted me in their employ. As it turns out, I was only a part of a very quiet "second wave" of layoffs – one designed to purged as many of the more experienced reps as possible so that they could be replaced by younger, inexperienced new hires – at $25-30,000 less than we had been making. I thought I was the only one - it turns out that there were dozens of "me's" out there - all of us being subject to these insane job flips and made-up regulations and Friday phone calls. The hope was that we would grow fed up enough to quit, thereby saving them severance monies. Oh, and that big 35% raise? That was designed to keep us all on board for the short-term, until they felt ready to be rid of us.

Well, that did not work out very well for them in my case, but that's another story.

This is an evil company. I am here to tell you, first hand, that Mr. Hanson and his cronies are the most dark, insincere - yes, I'll say it again - evil "professionals" I have ever had the displeasure of running across.

Thankfully, I escaped with my sanity intact and, in fact, have found myself in what has turned out to be the best job of my entire career, with a company as unlike Cengage as can be imagined. Over the last years, I have watched in bewilderment as fake Glassdoor awards have been granted, ill-conceived schemes like Unlimited trumpeted, hundreds more people laid off. The company I once knew is completely gone now, it's all newbies who truly seem to think that they are "changing the way the world learns."

I watch, as this new round of massive layoffs is revving up, and I cannot help but think to myself - Michael Hanson and his layers of nasty minions are finally getting what they deserve - they are finally beginning to eat themselves from the inside out. It s—s that so many people are about to find themselves out of work as the holidays are approaching, but they will be fine. They'll recover, just as the rest of us have. I must admit that it is a guilty pleasure watching the slow-motion failure of all the fakery, the egos, the happy-happy Kool Aid cult, and the nasty, back-handed and unnecessary cruelty that lies underneath it all.

I have never before shared the reality of my experience within Michael Hanson's Cengage. Now I finally have. May you rot, Mister Hanson - the Emperor truly has no clothes.

My stomach churned and my mind raced over that weekend. The only solution I could think of was to rent the cheapest token apartment in the center of my little zone and call that "home" officially while remaining in place where I was. I hated that solution, in that it was an unnecessary charade that was going to cost me something like $300+ per month for no reason, but I was still ahead of the financial game given the large raise I'd just received, so I was preparing to swallow that solution when - all of a sudden that Sunday - it dawned on me. A co-worker had just quit his sales job with Cengage and he was located in my hometown. It dawned on me that I was actually living in the approved "central zone" of HIS territory!

I didn't even wait until 8am that Monday to call the mid-management Scum! I dialed at 7:45, waited for him to pick up, and cheerily greeted him. I said that I had decided not to move house after all, to which he replied "I'm really sorry to hear that, we're going to hate to lose you . . . " to which, rather cheerily, I replied "Oh but you won't - we have an empty territory here where I live, I have decided I will take that one!"

"Oh" he replied, after a considerable pause. "I hadn't thought of that, what a convenient solution . . . uh, of course, we will have to clear this through the proper channels . . . " "Sure, go ahead" I answered, "Just let me know when you want me to start." I knew there was no way they could deny me this move, as I'd turned in five straight years of goal-making and led the way in many other respects, etc. etc. So I let them go through whatever reactions they went through and, later that Monday, I got a call from a different middle manager, someone who reported up to the first guy, and he indicated that I would have to sit for an interview prior to being approved. "Sure, just let me know when!"

And that was that. I sat for the silly little interview and, a week after having my job threatened, I found myself representing a new bookbag and reporting to a new Sales Manager.

That lasted four months.

Another Friday afternoon, another phone call. Same middle-scumbag as the first time. "We're making some changes!" he announced. "We've just had an opening in your area and we have decided to reassign you to the open territory, you are now a hardsider. You start Monday." I had been representing a different bookbag, btw.

Hm. Well, okay. Now I'm a hardsider. Met with the manager, traded off my marketing materials for new ones, and set about learning these new lists. . .

It wasn't even two months before the next Friday call came.

"Yeah, uh ... we've done some territory reconfigurations and your territory has been impacted." He then went on to describe my new territory, one which included only a couple of my current schools and that stretched away from my location - some five hours drive of a stretch. It was like one of those weirdo House or Senate configurations that political parties put together to maximize their reelection chances. Just made no sense. I held my breath, waiting for the news that I was going to be in violation of this non-centralized home location rule, but that didn't come up. Perhaps he'd forgotten about the made-up rule. I asked if I was to be granted the budget to cover the increase in overnights and, assured that was no problem, I simply replied "okay."

It dawned on me around this time that something was vastly amiss. Yes, I'm probably slow. But these decisions, they just made no logical sense. I'd been bounced from role to role for no real reason that I could discern. My direct-report was of zero help in understanding any of this - (s)he knew as little as I did and, in fact, did not even know about most of these Friday calls and changes until I called to tell him/her and ask what was going on. They were as out of the loop as I was and, I was later to learn, my manager had been operating under a PiP, or performance improvement plan, and was being targeted to be fired.

It was around this time they put me on a special weekly reporting plan, one which involved very long, detailed write ups of each sales contact I had made that week and another detailed plan outlining what I was lining up for the next week. This was NOT a "PiP" I was assured, as I hadn't actually missed any sales goals. They just wanted to ensure that I was "maximizing my potential" in this new role.

I was a very successful senior sales rep when Mr. Hanson joined the organization. I had been with the company for more than twenty years and had established a very successful track record during that time, missing my sales goal only two of those twenty-plus years.

It was, in fact, at a President's Club trip where I first met Michael Hanson and his henchman, the former Director of Sales. Hanson and Co. had only been on the job for a couple of weeks by that time, and I recall numerous c—tail gatherings scheduled up in his presidential suite and elsewhere on the resort grounds. These were optional in nature, but naturally we were quite curious about this new leader and, of course, eager to make a winning impression with the new leaders. It was here, in fact, that Hanson introduced his "Be Your Own CEO" concept - among others. The messaging was positive and powerful. I felt heartened.

One morning, just before the retreat ended, Hanson encouraged us to return to our rooms mid-afternoon - perhaps for a c—tail or a mid-afternoon shower break from the beach. He indicated that a surprise would be waiting for us in our rooms at that time. My trip partner and I promptly forgot the suggestion and left the grounds for an all-day exploration of our surroundings (Dominican Republic). Once we finally returned to the room in the early evening, I discovered an envelope waiting for me in the entryway, obviously having been slid under the door. Within the envelope was a letter from Mr. Hanson, thanking me for the past performance and looking forward to future success, blah blah blah. The note went on to say that, effective immediately, I would receive a 35% increase in my base pay.

I was flabbergasted, to say the least. I was already being pretty well compensated in my own mind, but this gesture was over-the-top. My friend was equally thrilled for me. He, too, had caught enough of the feel-good messaging that his impression of these new leaders was highly favorable. I remember just sitting there on the edge of my bed, probably somewhat open-mouthed, just amazed at how lucky I was to have found myself in this position.

Little did I realize just what kind of blood money that raise represented.

The trip ended and we returned home and I, at least, began to sing the praises of this new leadership to my colleagues and team-members in private phone conversations. The raise went unmentioned, of course, but those not on the reward trip were still sitting in wonder, knowing next to nothing about our new CEO and Director of Sales. To say I poured the Kool-Aid would have been an understatement. We were now our own CEO's, don't ya know.

And then, that Tuesday, four or five days after our return home from the President's Club event, a mass email appeared quite suddenly. In it, we were informed that approximately one third of the sales force had just been fired. It was confusing news, given the feel-good "glow" the retreat had left us with. Obviously, that move was how they were paying for our massive raises. Less-obviously, those massive raises were the bait designed to keep us on board until they could accomplish their immediate goals and were, at long last, ready to get rid of us, too. But that came later.

The summer passed and so did the 4Q sales period. The weirdness began early in the winter months, in the form of a surprise Friday morning phone call from a regional sales management member - representing one of the two newly-installed layers of sales management. Side note to indicate that the deployment of two extra layers of mid-management made little sense to me. There were now five people - management people - between me and the Nat'l Sales Manager, a position which seemed to be a token one at best, as she was seldom heard from. Instead, any and all important communications from on-high came from The Shark, the Director of Sales. At any rate, the phone rang one February Friday and I found myself talking to Mister Mid-Management himself, who indicated to me that there was a new company policy and that I was in violation of it. What was the new policy? Well, there WAS no actual new policy that had gone into effect, but I was not to discover that until much, much later. That Friday, I learned that the new policy required Reps to live "in or very near the center of their territorial geography." I lived just outside the outer edge of my geography, you see, and THIS - I was told - was a violation. "So what are you telling me?" I asked the slimeball on the other end of the phone. "It means that you have a month to relocate into the approved zone or resign your position with Cengage. Think about it over the weekend."

The "approved zone" he was referencing represented a crime-infested ghost town of a city that no one wanted to live anywhere near. I think this was a large part of the calculation at play. Obviously, there was no way I - or anyone else - would willingly move to such a place, therefore I was bound to quit, right?

Agreed, management's least concern is quality, because the company is a big fat money losing machine.

@11EY9SX9-1xsa I'm not saying the actual acts of what sales rep did is what is causing the downfall but it's the lack of accountability and quality control from management which leads to lack of sales, hunting/prospecting, preselling, etc. Allowing this to go on for 7 years creates a poor culture and lack of ownership and it seemed like management couldn't do a whole lot because they were too busy hiring because of turnover and training new employees.

@11EY9SX9-1jul Confirmed, not only did we buy booze, lunches, catering for professors but we also bought each other booze and lunch plus we shipped gift cards and starbucks points to all our friends and family and drove our company cars up and down I-95 for florida sun and manhattan nights. So, if you believe this is the cause of the downfall I'm either being serious or facetious.

I will agree with the last poster–it falls under leadership, not the coders, sales reps, product managers. All of the reasons above is why many folks are updating resumes and fearful of their jobs being laid off. In addition to the reasons, I would add that it is the inmates running the asylum on the sales side. The former National Sales Manager and his middle layer of management has created this toxic environment where there is much bullying, throwing folks under the bus, and covering one's backside. In addition to the toxic culture, sales reps are getting away with expensing gift cards to themselves without compliance, abusing fleet vehicles with personal trips, entertain customers with booze while getting loaded at the same time, and using the company AMEX for their own personal use. This has gone on for years while middle managers and DM's look the other way as long as they drink the company Kool-Aid and sing the praises of Engagement and Unlimited.

So far in this thread we've learned:

1. Leadership has refused to listen to customers for the past 7 years
2. Leadership forced a digital strategy that customers didn't want
3. Leadership implemented a business model that reduced revenue for the company even if unit sales increase
4. Leadership wanted to transform the company into a tech provider despite knowing nothing about tech
5. Leadership has been thin skinned and refuses to admit mistakes
6. Leadership has no clue what employees on the ground are doing

But the problem is with some front line coding manager, and not with the guy who has been steering the ship for the past 7 years. OK.

I love how they’re trying to scapegoat the coders when it’s still just MH and company doing what they do best, pontification and deflection that put is right where we are at. If these guys were Pearson agents working to undermine CL they couldn’t have done a better job to force a merger and fleece their way out if it...

@11EY9SX9-1jwe So in other words, here we have a PUBLISHING COMPANY (where Content people cannot deliver on time) that wants to be a TECH COMPANY (where no one knows exactly what programmers and techies do, nor how long it takes)???

Sounds like a winner to me, can't imagine why they struggle so!

There is only one LC in that district that meets the criteria you’ve shared, and there is no way they’d be dumb enough to post such negative things with such identifying information while still working here. Seems like you are trying to frame someone. Especially with how often you are repeating it.

It’s not the people coming in late and leaving early it’s the leadership that has put people in charge that let this happen because they have no idea what tech does.

Oh, that change is huge, it’s going to take three weeks is what we say and it takes maybe 8 working hours and we look like heroes when it’s done in the two weeks Content begs us to please make.

Our managers are clueless and the Content teams are thrilled we beat the original time frame and apologize because the content was most likely late or wrong anyway.

To the tech person who posted you work 3 days a week and take two hour lunches—you’re the reason good people are going to lose their livelihoods. Maybe if you put half as much effort into working as not working, the tech products and platforms would have performed better, and so would the company. It’s lazy people like you who sink an organization. Not MH.

@11EY9SX9-1doa ... I know I'd be out of a job, I was suspect and targeted as soon as it was discovered I wasn't drinking the kool aid, I was just playing along to get paid and watching the show from a high altitude of critical detachment and it was truly illuminating to be outside the walls of the cult and witness from a liberated perspective and see clearly what was truly happening. Those NES's started to become such bizarre effete Nuremberg rallies and so distorted that I had no choice but to leave and go into a better more rewarding industry, but I'm so fascinated by the quick decline of this once respectful publisher. I know who the weavils are burrowing into this mess and I still know quite a few people still employed and it's just bizarre, the entire experience. Of course MH has not earned one more month at this place, not one more week. He must have blackmail on someone.

Private equity seriously needs to demand that MH step down. How many mulligans does this guy get? Would any of YOU still have your jobs if you screwed up your job as badly as he has over the past 7 years?

Everyone posting here is expressing something unheard of in the executive nest of Cengage, it's called common sense. Or rather, applying critical thinking skills. If the posters beneath me were running this organization instead of the incompetent MH clown army there wouldn't be thread after thread after thread of Cengage current and ex employees pulling their hair out in frustration over the complete stupidity being witnessed semester after semester. In reality, we're witnessing cult behavior and the elders are about to begin distributing the Kool Aid except all of us here no exactly how this turns out, it's our friends in the business who are still immersed have no idea what is about to happen.

Completely agree with previous comment. I'm pretty sure that DM came from Pearson and they brainwash you in to drinking whatever Kool-Aid there is....or they were brainwashed by a former Pearson manager. It's pretty much the culture the former leader created. They wanted to get rid of what made Thomson (before it became Cengage) great–good content, valuable authors, and relationships made with experienced reps. They replaced it with defective technology, high prices caused by double digit increases, and poor support for customers. Most of the strong leadership left many years ago and remaining are the brainwashed DM types (especially the ones in Texas) that are saying the right things for the executive leadership. It comes off as fake, ingenuine, and creates a lack of trust.

I agree with all the other comments. I will add as well that what is tearing down Cengage is that it is a finance driven company vs. a company lead by sales. What I mean by that is the folks in finance has no clue on what's going on in the field, but dictates pricing, margin, what's best for the customer. I believe the group in Mason, OH think they are the "banker" in the gameshow "Deal or No Deal". Reps are the one who have to pick the cases where they can get the deal for the customer. If they don't the reps are the ones to spring the bad news and take the brunt of whatever customers they have left.

polish your resumes and get out while you can!

I have been with Cengage on the tech side for many years.

When I started SAM was a huge cash cow but aside from that the digital products were afterthoughts that were included with textbooks so that districts could spend money allocated for technology on them.

Over time textbooks were phased out. Even though I work in tech I still prefer textbooks and would be willing to pay more for them, maybe it’s a generational thing.

We were always told at some point digital sales would eclipse print and that digital should be the number one focus when that happened.

The big problem is (and always has been) that many of the directors/managers on the content side and the older staffers that have stuck around for a long time are absolutely clueless about digital and still produce product based on print schedules and processes.

We were supposed to do simpub, digital first, etc... but content can never get their head around things to actually make this happen so everything is usually late or has to be redone and things go way over budget.

Couple that with the fact that the digital teams are bloated and upper management doesn’t understand that the majority of my team comes in at 10 and leaves at 2 or 3 on most days, when they’re not working from home, and it’s easy to see why it takes so long to complete simple projects.

I remember BS flying in before she got canned and asking my whole group, about 30 of us to walk her through why things take so long and we all just snowed her with technobabble until she was convinced we were actually busy.

The best thing the Executive Team could do would be an audit on who is spending how many days on what and then ask managers why, of course the managers are mostly from print and wouldn’t be able to answer the questions because they don’t understand what their reports actually do.

I’ve sat through more boring meetings on process and paperwork than it takes me to actually compete projects.

OTOH it’s nice to be praised for being super productive for working 3 and a half days a week with two hour lunches.

I was shocked as an executive sales consultant in how dimwitted and brainwashed our dm in texas appeared over the entire cu rollout. anyone doing basic math would understand cu when implemented would evaporate current revenue. It would only be successful if we assumed professors are only price buyers and clearly they are not to the chagrine of MH. It was rather cynical and insulting for the executives to assume professors only considered price and could be easily bought. Our DM is still pushing the kool aid as if nothing has changed, it's so bizarre and of course there isn't the volume of takeaway business needed to fill in the vacuum CU created with current activation. New career after nearly two decades, here I come :)

The whole obsession with turning a textbook publisher into a tech company. None of our customers asked for it, and it turned many of them off. Moving the California office from Mountain View to San Francisco was a delusional joke. Leadership actually believed we could poach top tech talent paying publishing salaries in the most expensive cost of living city in the country.

@11EY9SX9-xww Very well said. It's interesting because I worked in product, not sales, but saw a lot of these same problems. Basically product had little to no interest in listening to what customers wanted....well, they would listen and tune out as soon as it ran counter to what they believed. The digital mantra was all consuming and anyone who thought that we should offer options to students was a heretic.

The biannual reorgs and whiplash-inducing strategy turns took an incredible toll on productivity and morale. I spent an entire year in one organization building relationships which influenced my work. One day that was all gone when we were told that we no longer cared what the instructors thought and would only focus on the student. After a month in the new organization I realized everything that I had worked on the past year was a complete waste based on the new strategy.

I think throwing a new strategy at the wall every year instead of understanding why the previous strategy didn't work was the biggest problem, and was MH's biggest contribution to the downfall of the company. We joke about his ego, but it really was a problem as it led to a mentality that no one could admit a mistake, which just led us to double down on bad strategies. That and the pressure from private equity to boost the valuation of the company post-bankruptcy are what really sunk the company in the long run. This is a mature industry that really didn't need a massive investment in new technology, but private equity demands explosive growth...and they didn't find it in higher ed.

Two major factors, above all else, as far as I can see.

The first was the digital force. This is the same phenomena that is currently sinking Pearson. Digital content delivery has a place in the education arena and it is eagerly desired in some corners. But not in place of paper and ink. Alongside paper and ink. Somewhere along the line, leadership decided that they could no longer make the printed textbook work for them, so they artificially jacked up the cost of print textbooks and then offered digital alternatives at overblown pricing - which is to say, priced at about what a physical book should cost. Cengage led the way in this regard, matter of factly charging $300 - 400 for a new textbook and around $120 for a digital version of that book with homework and study bells and whistles tacked on. This was - still is - precisely at odds with the marketplace. The documented fact is that 80% of students prefer a print textbook to a digital one. They just want to pay a fair price for it. Instead of offering students a choice and maintaining fair pricing practices, Cengage and Pearson have offered an "either or" proposition.

The industry said "no thanks."

The second massive misstep is this entire notion of reorging on a biannual basis. Internally, vital experience and knowledge was lost and in terms of sales, vital relationships were severed. Publishing sales is largely relationship sales - having a trusted and valued long-term rep in a position is gold, especially when one's competition is switching people out on a regular basis. During the early layoff sweeps, none of this was taken into account. A rep making $70-80k per year was sent away and replaced with a new hire making $50-55k. Many times, those new hires did not "stick" as the realities of pub repping are quite demanding – perhaps overly so at that rate of pay. And so many of these positions flipped a second, even a third time. Reps were shuttled around - handed new geographies and even new book bags - on a regular basis in an attempt to "harrass" them into quitting. Many seasoned former Cengage reps landed with competitors and made sport of gobbling up Cengage base.

The result of this was a decided shift in Cengage's market position. The once venerable Wadsworth, Southwestern, Course Technology, etc. institutions, as "Cengage," were now viewed as unstable, undependable. No one knew who their rep was and when reps WERE on campus, they were tasked with having conversations faculty were not looking to have - namely, the conversion to digital.

And that's that. In many ways, the end story on the likes of Cengage and Pearson is already written, it's just a matter of slow-motion decline. It's strange, as the music business learned how to change and adapt to new realities while these particular companies seem too stubborn to conform to their new realities.