Disgruntled IBMers Explain Why IBM is Circling Down a Death Spiral, Gerstner (Recently Deceased) Destroyed IBM in April 1993, and IBM Now Weaponises PIPs to Attack Its Own
Hours ago:
We've just checked again if anyone has covered mass layoffs at IBM Red Hat. Nope. Nothing since this morning (when one site cited Techrights).
IBM gets to mass-fire 400+ engineers and nobody in the media deems it newsworthy? What does this say about the state of today's media? The only "MSM" outlet that covered it had also been paid by IBM (its chief editor at the time admitted this to me; he came to our IRC network too).
Here are some interesting anonymous comments from the past few hours:
People are becoming increasingly savvy to IBM’s tactics and playbook. There’s a growing recognition that today’s IBM is not the same company it was decades ago.Layer onto that concerns about its DEI approach, a culture many describe as unusual or even toxic, and ongoing criticism that American employees are being displaced through aggressive offshoring—particularly with large-scale hiring in India.
You can also see a rising number of articles asking a basic question: what does IBM actually do anymore?
That said, the “buy” call isn’t necessarily wrong in the short term. Arvind and IBM still have a few levers to pull and plenty of buzzwords to capitalize on. But over the long term, the company appears to be in a gradual, sustained decline - a slow painful death spiral
[...]
IBM is in its last phase before death.
Financial aspect: Some few investors benefit from death. These investors are the ones holding IBM heavy debt. They will be sitting at table when the distribution of loot starts alongside the large shareholders. Small shareholders will take the losses.
Human aspects: The large population of US based engineers will most likely be the next victim of the demise of IBM. Any prospective future employer knows the current crop of IBM engineers are mediocre and lazy. They are working at IBM as a "maintenance tool". IBM is not striving or investing in any new progress. All the buzzwords are smoke screen for the Indian id--t at the top and his cabal of thieves.
[...]
I don’t know if it’s in its last phase of death. It is definitely in its death throes. But quick fast trading can be leveraged here. Like when terminal patients have a momentary health bounce back and clarity right before death. The stock will bounce up and down once they learn of some new buzz word or trend ti milk dry. So play the game with them get your money up! If anything they have proven to masters of manipulation and spin. They are kings of putting lipstick on a pig. But eventually reality comes as it always does and the truth of the situation emerges and there is a dip only for them to move onto the next hype train.
"I was there in [19]93," another person has said. "IBM DID NOT nearly go bankrupt as the arrogant G Man Gerstner would have you believe in his dancing elephant book. IBM over invested in mainframes and did not see WINTEL coming up from the bottom. It was Amdahl/Hitachi/Fujitsu mainframe clones as the government made IBM publish mainframe IP as part of an antitrust DOJ settlement. Yes there was a $8B loss but more than half of that was used for first time massive layoffs which was well over 100,000 people of 18 months. First time I saw IBM men and women cry in branch office mtgs (when IBM had many great IBM sales offices vs today's hotel lobbies). It was painful and scary but we were never worried IBM would go bankrupt" (as pro-Gerstner trolls would have us believe).
Another person has sice then said: "silly goose. IBM has PERFECTED layoffs since 1993. So much so they have used RA for 4 decades. Layoffs get some much state and federal scrutiny. Much better to just batter IBM people mentally hour after hour and put them in the PIP sausage grinder. Leave quietly with no muss no fuss no severance. Did you see the Easter Bunny too?"
We covered this before. RTOs and PIPs are two among many tools in IBM's toolbox. It also bribes the media to produce glorious puff pieces about IBM while looking away when there are layoffs.
"I left a week ago and before I left I was hoping to be laid off because I was so scared of pip," someone then said, soon to receive this reply: "why does no one call them out on this BS. We all know what they are doing and how they perverted the system (pip) and we-ponized it. We all know it. They know it. But in the office no one utters a word about its true nature. Everyone just nods their head and agrees. Outside of work everyone speaks of its true nature. It’s so bizarre" (it's not given how the media got sedated). █
