Posted on 01/28/2009 10:51:49 AM PST by an amused spectator
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- With the recession forcing tech companies to announce thousands of layoffs, IBM Corp. is joining the fray -- but not advertising it.
The Armonk, N.Y.-based company has cut thousands of jobs over the past week, including positions in sales and the software and hardware divisions. IBM says the cuts are simply part of its ongoing efforts to watch costs, and the company won't release specific numbers, even as reports of firings stream in from IBM facilities across the country.
Workers have reported layoffs in Tucson, Ariz.; San Jose, Calif.; Rochester, Minn.; Research Triangle Park, N.C.; East Fishkill, N.Y.; Austin, Texas; and Burlington, Vt.
Meanwhile, other tech companies such as Intel Corp., Microsoft Corp., Texas Instruments Inc., Sprint Nextel Corp. and Google Inc. have all publicly revealed job cuts as part of their strategies for riding out the economic crisis. More than 20,000 jobs will be lost from those companies alone.
One of IBM's biggest rivals -- Hewlett-Packard Co. -- is also laying people off. HP is shedding 24,600 jobs, nearly 8 percent of its 320,000-employee work force, as it digests the acquisition of Electronic Data Systems Corp.
IBM says it doesn't have to reveal the number of jobs it is cutting, since the Securities and Exchange Commission requires companies to disclose only ''material'' events. And IBM considers its job cuts a regular part of the company's business model, since thousands of jobs are cut every year but are usually added back in other places.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
“Meanwhile, staffing in India has jumped from just 9,000 workers in 2003 to 74,000 workers in 2007.”
Those are just American lay-offs. They are still actively recruiting H1Bs
IBM goes through these cycles.
In the meantime, out of the people I know who retired from IBM or are ex-workers, any of them who are worth a dam are almost always offered contract/consultant work after a year or so off.
From the article:
IBM's ongoing labor adjustments have led the company to add bodies in cheaper and higher-growth parts of the world, like India.
In 2007, the last full year for which detailed employment numbers are available, 121,000 of IBM's 387,000 workers were in the U.S., down slightly from the year before. Meanwhile, staffing in India has jumped from just 9,000 workers in 2003 to 74,000 workers in 2007.
The disgusting puke of a CEO was on TV kissing Obama’s butt. He was gushing all over Obama’s “stimulus” plan.
“IBM goes through these cycles.”
I was part of the 1991 reduction. Down sized after 25 years in IT. Just have to move on...
hey were very busy mid to late 90’s for Y2K. You probably could have easily got back in.
BTW, I’m not an IBM employee, nor do I play one on TV, but I am a contractor who deals with them very often.
...the cuts were in anticipation of the failed Obama policies.
It is their way of saying; “buck Ofam
...never mind...probably get deleted by the admin mod.
IBM gave me a great exit package, with pension, when I left. I was able to get a higher paying consulting contract as a System Programmer for the State of NC. IBM did OK by me. They didn’t owe me anything.
A couple of years ago I was a contractor for a small firm that got bought by IBM. Soon after most of the people on our project were let go, and then the project was been outsourced to India. Two of the employees that were left actually had to go to India to hand over everything and teach them how we did everything. Then they were promptly let go.
My cousin who got her pink slip from Sprint Monday said she found out “her” job is going to India.
Ouch!
The huge jump in employment in India has FAR more to do with the fact that the middle east is starting to off shore their IT (cause they have squat for infrastructure) to India. Off shoring their IT to either EU or to the US is too costly due to US labor costs and trans oceanic high bandwidth circuit costs.
You will see the numbers in India fall after several of the IT infrastructure projects in Dubai / Cairo and other locations come on line as many of the off shoring will come back “home”.
Free trade is good for India. I knew there had to big layoffs the market is up...they love it when people lose their jobs.
Some things never change. I worked at a sprint building- second job in security...on a Friday, the American workers were let go and escorted out of the building...On Monday, the Indian H1B visa workers arrived...
On Tuesday, the Feds should've been escorting the company executives out of the building in handcuffs. Unfortunately, nobody in political office seems to care.
For those who have not had the experience, the lure of India is that they can speak and read english, and hence write quarterly reports. Chinese on the other hand may speak it (and read) but they can’t write reports. I used the work with each group for years. The Chinese were very smart, in general, and the women were nice.
Good idea....but you wont see much support from the anti-American Obamaists...or the anti-American Liberal Free Trade Globalists.
The best way to stop anti-American outsourcing is to put a VAT on companies who hire foreign labor over American labor...companies hiring American labor get tax breaks..up to not even paying taxes.
With 70% of the economy based on consumer spending....it is absolutely stupid for companies to fire the consumers....and stupid for liberals and Liberal Free Trade Globalists to continue to promote anti-Americanism
In the eyes of corporate America:
Indians are seen as rude. As a programmer, I appreciated their bluntness but the users hated to deal with them. Indians are very accomplished at making you look stupid. I actually heard an Indian programmer tell a user to “Be quiet” during a meeting. They are quick to tell you where you are wrong and they are usually right. Diversity issues tend to be lost on them which can cause friction.
If Indians are verbally hard to understand, Chinese are impossible to understand. Not only that, Chinese programmers have abysmal written grammer but tend to be better at following orders.
I’ve worked with several Arabic Muslim programmers and they are the best of the lot. Perfect speech and very innovative.
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