IBM Turning Up the 'RTO' (Stress) and 'PIP' (Fear) Heat on Workers, Rebellion May be Brewing
Judging by this new threat (and thread), some workers grew impatient and intolerant of the classic trick of "RTO", which is notorious for being a tool of silent layoffs.
One comment hinted at more RTO: "Full RTO coming in early May. Start preparing yourself." Someone then said, "what RTO is that when IBM is downsizing, laying off it's employees and closing offices left , right and center throughout the US ? All the talk from Alvind and his sc--wed up Indian workforce about AI, Quantum, Security, cloud etc. is a load of BS going nowhere. The IBM Titanic is going no where but sinking down to the depths of mediocrity. And it ain't coming back."
In January of 2026 (i.e. start of this month) many at Red Hat became IBM staff (instead! No more fedora!) and RTO was taken up a notch. IBM clearly wants to get rid of many workers; if it can abstain from the "RA" or "layoff" label, then... no severance. Champagne for "business success" in IBM's boardroom, right?
Sometimes it feels like today's executives at IBM view IBM workers as a liability. This isn't the old IBM, especially predating the now-dead Gerstner.
In another threads someone hints at unionising (like in Europe): "The Works Councils (Unions) in Germany and Holland have not agreed to using this latest IBM performance system. They are completely unaffected by this 15/75/15 %. ranking system. How lucky these employees are to be protected from IBM's disgraceful behaviour towards its workforce. It would be great to have sight of the Works Councils grounds and assessment of IBM's performance management system." Then there's the ongoing IBM PIP lawsuit. Someone correctly pointed out that "they will be obligated too during discovery for this case and then that will open Pandora’s box for them with dozens of additional suits when that information is registered into public accessible databases. They will fight this very hard or settle to ensure that doesn’t occur..."
As we'll show some time in the future, the lawsuit against my wife and I didn't go as an outsider might be led to assume. The litigant attempted to settle at least 5 times, including twice on the first day of the trial. During the trial, under sworn oath, he was forced to admit many very embarrassing things (in some ways self-incriminating) and his disclosures (similar to discovery) revealed a lot of mischievous things he had done behind the scenes.
Sometimes people dread going to trial because of stuff they're hiding and never want the public to see. █