Thanks for the repost. Bad management and a $16 Billion dollar market cap make them a prime target to be acquired in the near future. I used to think the stock was underpriced due to the good branding and available technology & equipment. However, when you have a top-heavy management team (Country Manager and above) across all their PSL's concerned only with meeting their employment and stockholder needs on revenue and EPS rather than customer needs by overbidding on projects/contracts (calling you out, Team Red) and laying off productive and knowledgeable field employees/Technical & Business Development Professionals that are not part of the internal good-old-boys network. It's no wonder a lot of operators followed these dejected castaways to your competitors and refuse to do that much business with you anymore.
Prior to being layed-off years ago, I attended Block II in Houston where I enthusiastically recited daily: "Halliburton only hires, trains, and retains the best people." I was devastated when I got terminated and took a long time to recover. My position was terminated when Big Red grossly overbid on the contract trying to convince the operator that we had the best available "People, Processes, and Technology" during the failed merger with Bakers Hughes. Usually after a disastrous military campaign since ancient times, it was the commander and higher officers who were severely disciplined, dismissed, and outright executed - and not the soldier who bravely fought on the battlefield (unless you were a frontline soldier of France during WW1). Nevertheless, my field job was sacrificed and those who drew up the horrible bid still kept their jobs with quite a few of them promoted. The remaining field staff were demoralized and wracked with survivors guilt for years.
To the management of Halliburton, you are the cancer to the current low morale of the company, low share price, and uncertain future. I'm sure you are still holding onto your shares and hubris thinking the terms of the sale and acquisition will go to your advantage. You are wrong, any potential buyer who analysis the company will know that you cannot make chicken salad with the chicken s#$% you are trying to sell the customers. You might have good equipment and technology, but not enough skilled people left who know how to effectively use it. You might think you have good processes, but they only exist in the Black Book or on a power point slide, and not always practical in real world applications.
In conclusion, God gives us talent, but the devil makes us famous. Many of your top management sold their souls for riches and titles through the blood, sweat, and tears of those they used, mistreated, and sacrificed. How many tens of thousands of redundant workers and shattered dreams is Jeff Miller and company responsible for? I just hope it's a Chinese company that acquires you and retains your employment just long enough so you can experience the employment uncertainty and depression us lowly employees you convenient call "losers" and "lowlifes" behind closed doors in board rooms have experienced. The only way to cure cancer is to permanently remove all of it. The Devil always get his due.