Posted on 07/01/2002 6:58:20 AM PDT by UnBlinkingEye
-----Original Message-----
From: Vervynckt, Lawrence
Sent: Thursday, June 13, 2002 4:10 PM
To: Brown, Dick (mail centre); Brown, Dick (Mail Box)
Cc: EDS Americas Employees; EDS Employees; EDS;
'presweb@pobox.upenn.edu'; NISC ALL EMPLOYEES
Subject: memo to Dick Brown
Dick,
There are ethical ways to cut costs, and then there is executive greed. Your comment at the recent shareholder's meeting will be your legacy, like it or not ("I have to make that much money, I have an expensive wife.").
Most of the people were proud to work for EDS and liked/like what they do/did at one time, but no more. Most EDS employees made personal sacrifices (eg. worked long hours, traveled extensively, worked weekends) and that wasn't enough to keep their jobs.
It seems to me that your MBA is not worth the paper it is printed on. You don't understand that all EDS has is its PEOPLE! It does not make ANYTHING! Some clients have good working relationships with certain (ex)employees and when you have a (mis)manager (that, by the way, couldn't manage his way out of a paper bag) get rid of a person like that, then the client is very unhappy - service slips, and bad feelings fester. I know, you will say the 'dashboard' doesn't show it. It's like the old saying - Those that can, do; Those that can't, teach; and Those that can't teach, manage.
You have shown that you care only about short-term gains (and it ain't happening right now) at the expense of long-term harm to the company. Some people are being let go because they use the open door policy. Everyone knows that if you complain about anything going on you're next in line to be let go from the company. People are let go for 'workforce reduction' - NOT performance (as you have said in the press), NOT because their skill sets had slipped (as stated by Jim Daley in the press).
Dick, NO ONE believes you ANYMORE. Your memos are a laughing matter for 90% of the employees (the 10% are your 'yes-men' you have surrounding you). Paydays are so stressful and tense, it is pathetic - the backstabbing of employees to climb over each other is cannibalistic in nature - Is this your new corporate culture? Because that is what's happening.
Talk to some of your former employees - they have nothing to lose by telling you the truth - if you dare to talk to any of them, or if they would talk to you. There are ways to save money that doesn't involve cutting employees - But I will not list them here.
Here are some questions that I believe you should answer for the employees-
1) What are your IT contingency plans for third world unrest?
2) How can you justify your $55 Million Salary when the stock price has not consistently been rising and remaining at levels close to or above IBM? The answer you gave at the shareholder's meeting is unacceptable and makes a mockery of the company.
3) Why has EDS not been at the forefront of Software development? With the talent that existed (and still exists), surely some revolutionary software could have been produced that would catapult EDS to household name status.
4) Why is there no consistency of management practices between accounts?
5) Why is it that you can visit Copenhagen, Fiji, Tokyo, or Bremerhaven for the EDS image yet cannot visit Bethlehem, PA, Fairborn, Ohio, Richmond, VA, St. Louis, MO, Winchester, KY, or South Carolina for boosting employee morale?
6) Why are you so inaccessible to the average employee?
7) What is your corporate plan - In specific detail? I'm not talking about the weekly Science Fiction newsletter that you produce. I'm talking of YOUR Goals. Where are you leading this company? Where do you envision EDS to be 5 years from now?
8) Are you aware of the discrepancy between your vision and the vision and attitude of middle management? When will you get them on the same page as yourself (provided you have a plan in place)? If you don't realize, middle management has a feudalistic approach to their employees and accounts they manage. Many of their practices go against EDS corporate directives.
9) If some accounts warrant H1B employees and outsourcing to places such as Mexico, India, etc. why don't you discuss them with employees and let them know what is going on (status of contracts, terms, etc)?
10) How is it that there is no coherent retraining policy within EDS? If someone is currently on the bench, they have to fend for themselves via EDS University with no clue as to what is available - what projects are upcoming, what technologies are needed to make them billable once again. For Example, an employee comes on the Bench. He/She is mainframe oriented. There is a project coming up somewhere else that requires SAP. Shouldn't management and yourself be responsible for guiding that employee in the right direction so that they can get onto that SAP project and become billable once again rather than have the employee slog their way through online courses with no direction whatsoever.
11) You maintain that the IT industry is a very fluid culture. Why is the company still adhering to IDP's? In the example of #10 above, the employees IDP may not list SAP as a personal goal. However, if it were a difference between being employed and not being employed, the employee would definitely make the sacrifice and learn SAP. This makes the IDP useless.
12) Why does EDS still adhere to the "Bell Curve" for ranking employees? This forced ranking is a failure and has proven such in many school systems.
13) Why is it my Director has the autonomy to make significant business decisions nationwide, yet a .50 cent raise request has to go to 3 levels above him to someone who has no clue regarding the validity of the request?
14) Why are we, "the leaders in global technology solutions", still using such as antiquated system as CAS?
15) Why does a staffing request to replace an entry-level, $8/hr employee have to go all the way to Paul Chiapparone?
16) Ah yes - the forced ranking system. So - you have 5, highly tenured, highly skilled leader-level employees. However, based on the "rules", somebody is going to get screwed.
17) Why is it that we repeatedly hear the rhetoric of how valued our employees are, and how we reward the top performers, yet a "1" employee's raise request submitted 30 days prior to due, ends up getting approved 3 month's late because it sat in multiple Upper Management's "to-do" list too long.
18) Isn't it fraud (to your customers) to sell a contract using a domestic model, then shifting processes (using personnel not involved in the development of those processes) offshore, where work ethic and fundamental service ideals are radically different from those sold as part of a contractual obligation to a customer? (In traditional manufacturing industries, the aforementioned practice is known as bait & switch)
19) Isn't is also fraud (to the stockholders) to form a shell corporation (namely EDS Resource Management Corporation) for the sole purpose of masking compensatory losses by way of transferring personnel without their knowledge to this corporation prior to laying them off, thereby operating that business at a loss, so as not to impact the stock price of EDS?
20) Isn't it fraud (to your domestic labor force) to harness talent and resources only long enough to construct process framework, only to leave them high and dry without severance, then tie up their 401Ks (that in some cases are propping up your stock price) for weeks on end?
21) Isn't it fraud (to your remaining domestic workforce) to tell them that their jobs are secure, provided their performance and production is up to EDS's "high standards (until you have their functions documented and shifted to cheaper labor)? --- If you have answers to any of these questions that would pass as anything other than doublespeak, please feel free to address them in future "letters from Dick" internally. Please be sure to quote the above questions verbatim when responding, so as not to diminish the intent of the question.
Please also free to address these questions (again VERBATIM) with your Board of Directors who, if they are not yes-men and woman, may take a dim view of the direction of your 'leadership'.
Larry Vervynckt
Information Analyst
EDS - DBA AND PHILIPS SEMICONDUCTOR TEAM
MS TRNG
1401 E. Hoffer
Kokomo, IN 46902
BTW I hope I didn't violate the profanity rule by posting the source URL, if I did my apologies.
We should ask Larry.
Much less the rest of the world. How far do you think this e-mail has gone already?
That may not be enough here. Hopefully he has enough money saved that he can live off for a while.
I think I'll turn on CNBC and see if they report it.
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