Posted on 03/22/2019 10:29:09 AM PDT by Red Badger
Multiple employees say that Disney has been less than forthcoming about who will be let go and when.
At Walt Disney's shareholder meeting two weeks ago, CEO Bob Iger spoke of the "long-term value" inherent in the company's pending acquisition of most of 21st Century Fox. "We will hit the ground running as soon as the deal closes," he told attendees.
The flowery language, arguably befitting of such a monumental deal, was typical of the comments coming from Disney for more than a year as regulators slowly approved the partial merger.
Nary a public word was spoken about layoffs, but less than two days after the $71.3 billion deal officially closed at two minutes past midnight ET on Wednesday, it was clear that hitting the ground running means, at least initially, lots of lost jobs.
"Today I hate everybody," said one nervous employee who worries for his job. "I hate Disney for buying Fox, I hate Fox for selling, I hate the politicians for allowing it to happen."
Part of the frustration, multiple employees tell The Hollywood Reporter, is that Disney has been less than forthcoming about who will be let go and when. Regarding severance, employees have been told they will get two weeks of pay for every year served, with a maximum of two years in severance pay.
Says one Disney employee: "We feel like we're the ones who have been acquired because the people at Fox know what their severance packages are, if they are going to get let go, and nobody at Disney knows anything. People are panicking — and rightfully so — because nobody is telling them anything."
Indeed, Disney hasn't disclosed the number of jobs that would be lost — and that has yet to change. Analysts estimate 4,000-10,000, though several employees say the number being floated among people in the know is closer to 3,000.
Among the many assets Disney purchased was the Fox film and TV studio, where several in senior leadership were given notice throughout the day on Thursday, including 20th Century Fox film president of domestic distribution Chris Aronson, president of worldwide marketing Pamela Levine, co-president of marketing Kevin Campbell and chief content officer Tony Sella.
An employee at the Fox studio lot described a "revolving door of execs going in and out of a conference room staffed with Disney HR."
Others at Fox getting their walking papers included international distribution president Andrew Cripps, executive vp corporate communications Dan Berger, executive vp legal affairs Bob Cohen and executive vp publicity Heather Phillips.
One employee on the TV side told THR how disheartened the television employees were at witnessing the carnage in film, but later the ax began to fall there, as well, with Twentieth Television president Greg Meidel let go.
Disney also laid off Fox Consumer Products boss Jim Fielding and sources say that of about 50 U.S.-based staffers in that division, five have received pink slips. "I've never seen anything like this — from any company," says a Fox employee who witnessed Thursday's drama.
Disney has said all along that it intends to save $2 billion annually by 2021 due to cost savings brought about by the merger, and such rhetoric usually means jobs will be lost. "This is what happens in mergers," explains Northlake Capital Management founder Steven Birenberg. "It's partially the point, as cost savings boost the financials."
Meanwhile, over at Fox Corporation, which now consists of the assets Disney did not purchase, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business Network and the Fox broadcast network, CEO Lachlan Murdoch announced to employees that all of them were owners of the new company as each of them would be be gifted between $1,000-$3,000 in stock, depending on their years of service..
One of the biggest surprises Thursday was that Disney said it would shutter Fox 2000, the label famous for mid-budget films like The Devil Wears Prada and Hidden Figures. Disney expects to complete production and distribution of Fox 2000's The Art of Racing in the Rain with Kevin Costner and The Woman in the Window with Amy Adams and Gary Oldman, and perhaps other movies in the works at the label.
"I'm honestly angry, shocked and really, really hurt. As a life time fan of all things Disney, this is difficult for me to say, but I think the shuttering of Fox 2000 is going to go down as the one big mistake The Mouse has made in an otherwise flawless strategy," said Marty Bowen, producer of Fox 2000 titles like Fault in Our Stars and Love, Simon.
Bowen added, "The 2000 Bungalow is a safe haven for filmmakers. A place where laughter and tears coexist and where the first thought was always 'what's best for the movie.' I know efficiencies must be achieved when two behemoths become one, but we can never forget the importance creativity and passion play in the process of making great movies."
Years ago the company I worked for bought a competitor. I figured all was well since we were the big company acquiring a much smaller one.
They didn’t tell us the plan was to adopt the (awful) corporate culture of the acquired company—until it was too late.
It's a cookbook!
Time Warner was “bought out” by AOL in the 1990s in a hostile takeover. Then, after the sale was official, AOL opened their books to reveal that much of that money was built on speculation of AOL’s future subscriber base and wasn’t real.
Lotsa pissed-off TW employees as the stock did a nosedive from over $100/share to under $10/share. Yes, indeed. Since TW had a generous stock purchase plan for employees, a lot of employees were heavily invested.
The AOL Board were quickly dispatched in a palace coup so the top dogs became TW people but the damage was done. Time Warner Cable was then split off from the rest of Time Warner because it was considered the most profitable asset so it could be sold to keep the other divisions afloat.
I remember that.......................
And AT&T just bought TW, so it all begins again
Layoffs usually happen on Saturdays so that you are assured of a pleasant weekend. (I wonder how many office shootings we shall hear about.)
Layoffs are murder. They are life-changers.
That is how the fascism worded it and what modern socialists believe.
[/l] <---- lib (speaking)
Having gone through a few, I have a template for mergers.
1. Evaluate where you sit. If you are in a fungible position (accounting, management, etc) get the resume polished up.
2. Evaluate your current location. If you are in a factory, and the combination of the merger means the supply will exceed the demand, call a head hunter today.
3. Look at the culture. If you don’t feel you will mesh with the new company, prepare an exit.
In other words, assume that you will be let go and prepare accordingly. Made it through three so far and left one before it got time to cut heads. Didn’t regret any of it.
Be a merc, not a company man. The company doesn’t care about you.
Good advice. Also works for corporate restructuring.
And then they proceeded to lose $13 billion dollars.
Suddenly the leftist herders do not like herding politics.
So you can watch your job get outsourced to India?
Nowadays they’ll just bring the Indians here...
Far too many people don’t look at the dynamics both inside their company and outside; they don’t look at how they help (personally) to contribute to the bottom line, and what might endanger their positions until it is too late.
I remember many years ago when that little book “Who Moved My Cheese” was circulating; it was designed to make employees look at the larger picture (especially in light of globalization, considering when it was released). People couldn’t assume their jobs would be safe just because they’d always worked those jobs; there were powerful forces at work to either move jobs overseas (as technology made this easier) or move foreigners here (as corruption made that easier). As a white guy I always warn others: Your knowledge is your best job security, and guard it closely; no reason to pass along decades of accumulated wisdom to someone sent to take your job (either a foreigner or affirmative action token). Many FReepers describe how Asians can be uncooperative coworkers; I suspect many of them are influenced by populations where dozens of educated people are lined up to replace you when you let down your guard.
The days of spending decades working in a job with skills that age quickly are over for most professions; you will either be “in school” (figuratively, if not literally) forever or your value quickly drops.
Gee... sorry about your luck! /s
The upside... there are at least one million plus UNFILLED jobs available and waiting in the economy at this point in time.
With bank mergers I suspect that lower salaries/less accumulated benefits were keys to keeping your job; it didn’t seem the most experienced people were kept on in cases of duplication, but instead younger, cheaper people were safe. A nightmare to deal with...
Occupy Wall Street, at its inception, held demonstrations (shown on the news) where laid-off Americans demonstrated in front of their former NYC employers while their foreign replacements entered the buildings in the background; in cases where foreigners were unavailable, it seemed financial institutions simply swapped staffs to reset salaries and accumulated vacation time. Scary stuff - and it plays no small role in our negative birthrate today. First they gave the jobs to the foreigners; now they sell the homes to them that Americans won’t risk buying.
Many of the baby boomers are hitting retirement age (just retired a few months ago myself) and leaving with a ton of knowledge about the inner workings of their organization.
I expect to see lots of “strange things” happen when the knowledge is lost.
Most senior managers (private or public sector) are amazingly clueless about how to make the trains run on time in their organization.
Details matter, and the worker bees that know those details really matter.
I’m watching that happen at my job (guys with decades of knowledge retiring), and honestly they’re replacing them 2-for-1 with either white women who are only slightly younger, or foreign women who are much younger - and neither pair comes close to the knowledge the retiring guy had - even combined. Another FReeper posted on a related thread a while ago about bank branch managers; our area (northeastern NJ) has been hit with a double whammy of retirements coupled with the flight of many Americans from this area, so people who barely qualified as admin assistants are being dressed up as managers. Most of the bank staff in my area are foreigners and female; the manager is just the oldest one.
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