Thread regarding IBM layoffs

The "office building" will soon be like the VHS tape or the shopping mall.

Telecommuting is not going away, the office is.

So you're saying that line management - the people who contribute nothing and just hide hoping no one notices - should stand up and make noise against the executives? Not bloody likely. And even if they did they would all be laid off, and the company would actually be better off.

believe me that a few of us are fighting to get you raises and bonuses

There is too much infighting among managers for whatever little is left after Ginni plundered IBM.

@2wfh: best if line management can (1) jointly sign a petition of non-confidence in the board AND (2) innovate or sell to create opportunity for your reports instead of "managing".

This is so true...

The IBM clients we support in GTS don't have any new technology to speak of.

There is no need to "skill up faster", more like "dumb down" if anything.

As someone who is a people manager and fully client billable, the comments on here are shocking but very much reflective of the malaise affecting my team. We can all agree that the company’s treatment toward employees is abysmal and believe me that a few of us are fighting to get you raises and bonuses, but we can’t get them for you when we haven’t won enough business and the bit that we win is too low margin. However, I wish people would realize that your “experience” matters for nothing when I have clients who demand people trained in new skills and aren’t willing to let a band 9 or 10 “learn on the job.” We all know that RAs got rid of too many people with those valuable skills but those decisions are made higher up than me and I have to deal with the damage.

Blame S&D for not selling high margin work, blame the bloated Partner structure for the RAs, blame India for having the funds to skill up faster than local teams. Some of us are trying, but the company fights us constantly and nobody higher up will listen.

"Why should they get higher salaries than me when my skills are more relevant in the workplace today?"

Because IBM doesn't represent the entire "workplace." They need the skills they need for the work they do.

I graduated from school by getting every major external certification possible (AWS, Azure, Google, Cisco, PMP, SAP, Lean, SAFe just to make a few), why should I have “lower” salary requirements?

Certification is a great way to show that you have expertise in a particular area. I believe your salary expectations should be higher - for the moment.

If I am looking for someone to write "a Kubernetes chart to deploy a machine learning model at scale in a customer AWS environment", I would certainly want someone with specific skills. If am looking for someone to design such a system, I want more. The wider the project, the wider the experience. Certifications, direct experience, and years in the trenches, all need to be considered.

Here's the thing about certifications: in five years, tools and AI replace many of the related skills. Writing "Kubernetes Charts" in 2023 will be equivalent to coding TCP/IP assembler routines in 2000 or writing JCL in 1985.

If you ever think you know enough, you are already washed up. IBM should be building the tools that put us all out of a job in 5 years. Ironically, that's the best way to ensure we have jobs in 10.

You must have spent a ton of time and money on all those certification's and IBM don't recognize a single one of them. Good Lord, you are a true bluebird for life. Just no common sense at all.

Typical Paper Cert Fool with all those certs and no real world experience. Have you ever heard of jack of all master of none. Seems to me you have no clue what you want to do besides study. You are probably that person who contributes nothing to the company and spend most of your time cramming for your next cert and jumps ship yearly before the companies realize you don't know $hit. Or you may work for some Consulting/body shop company were it's easy to be mediocre and jump from project to project never delivering any value to the client.

When I’m a “younger folk” who has spent the last 5 years since I graduated from school by getting every major external certification possible (AWS, Azure, Google, Cisco, PMP, SAP, Lean, SAFe just to make a few), why should I have “lower” salary requirements? Most of the people on my team are a good 15-20 years older than me and haven’t done a thing to improve themselves professionally in the past 5 years we’ve been on this team. Why should they get higher salaries than me when my skills are more relevant in the workplace today? Just some food for thought.

Congrats, you've caught up to the common knowledge of 20 years ago.