It took me 2 months and a threat to hire a lawyer to get my separation package.
Management keep the their friends that they hired that didn't know a thing about writing or testing software.
Heck one of the people they hired into the click hadn't work a month oit of the year and three months that he was there before I was laid off.
Worst company to work for I recommend that if you are offered a job or you see a job posting from CA ignore it and run the other way.
Maybe your friends are fine and aren't the problem....
CA is a really crappy company to work for unless you are a Golden Boy or Girl. If your boss likes you, you get ALL the plum assignments, but if they don't you get the really crap jobs/accounts or nothing. I saw this happen multiple times, and I saw people promoted very quickly just because they were "chosen ones" who got assigned to all the best opportunities. Those people got all the accolades and couldn't fail.
It's a political minefield there, major reorgs were done every year I was there, and head chopping occurs often from the exec level down to the field infantry. I've never seen a company where so many good people got shot so often.
I really grew to hate working there, and I never had ANY trust or confidence in my bosses. Decisions appeared to get made that just didn't make any sense, and many of us labored hard in darkness while the favored ones got everything handed to them on a silver platter. Glad I'm out of that awful place - it was driving me crazy and actually endangered my marriage because I grew very depressed and acted negatively because of it. If you value your emotional and mental health, don't ever go to work there.
No when they laid off they told me I would get it on the last pay day of the month. When I call HR about not receiving it she was told me it was pushed out to the end of the next month because the severance package had not been processed in time. This was the say reply after the second month as well. That was when I told them I was getting a lawyer. I was not the only one they were doing this to. There was 2 others besides me.
Say what you want about CA, layoffs occur all the time. I've been gone for about 2 years, and don't have many positive things to say about my time there. One thing I can say though, they do offer severance if you are laid off. They do not if you are a terminated for poor performance (in the USA anyway), based on your post, I assume you were being managed out (fairly or unfairly) and that is why you were not given a severance package until you engaged a lawyer. I know a lot of people that were laid off there in the last 2 years and EVERYONE was given a severance package. If you are looking for work still, I would suggest NOT going to IBM. They no longer offer severance in the same way CA did when I was let go. Not sure if things changed during your layoff, but something doesn't sound right.
That correct in regards to cliques. I was a manager at CA who was laid off. My manager had a team of loyal buddies reporting to him and a couple of us outliers. When layoffs came, he gave my job to his friend whose project had just gone away. He had no management experience, even worse barely any experience in our field! Several of my team called me asking who is this guy? Why was he chosen? I didn't have the heart to tell them why so just told them to support him. A departmental ghost who suddenly appeared. He hid from my team until he could find something else. It was heartbreaking for me because I built the team from an existing mismanaged mess and they were really coming together. My team was stunned for a while, not being able to make sense of the change. That's how it goes when people misuse their power. Let's lay off a competent manager who has been successfully building a troubled team because my buddy lost his project and needs a job. The other two outliers reporting to my manager were laid off in later rounds while the loyal buddies were preserved. That's the CA way and I guess plenty of other companies. I think I need better friends.