18,000 Microsoft Jobs Gone Eventually? | Hacker News Reader

18,000 Microsoft Jobs Gone Eventually?

minimsft.blogspot.com

Cutting quickly - this is a really good point.

I remember when the last layoffs were implemented at Yahoo, they let half the people who were laid off stay as contractors for upto 1 year! These guys killed the already dying culture - all they did was interviewed in other companies, mentioned what kind of salaries they are getting and to rub salt in our wounds, kept on telling us the severance packages (which was pretty sizable) which Yahoo will be giving them at the end of their contract period - by which time they will have another job nicely teed up!

Scott Thompson really wasn't very smart.

Unfortunately, they won't be. According to this internal memo, they're supposed to lay everyone off over the next 6 months:

"The first step to building the right organization for our ambitions is to realign our workforce. With this in mind, we will begin to reduce the size of our overall workforce by up to 18,000 jobs in the next year. Of that total, our work toward synergies and strategic alignment on Nokia Devices and Services is expected to account for about 12,500 jobs, comprising both professional and factory workers. We are moving now to start reducing the first 13,000 positions, and the vast majority of employees whose jobs will be eliminated will be notified over the next six months. It's important to note that while we are eliminating roles in some areas, we are adding roles in certain other strategic areas. My promise to you is that we will go through this process in the most thoughtful and transparent way possible. We will offer severance to all employees impacted by these changes, as well as job transition help in many locations, and everyone can expect to be treated with the respect they deserve for their contributions to this company."[1]

It makes absolutely no sense. Exactly what you describe is going to happen, except that by not telling everyone, it'll also cause people who won't be fired to look around at competing jobs with the impending possibility that they'll be fired. I bet some of them will take some of those jobs regardless and leave.

It seems to me like the whole thing was rushed for before earnings come out. They weren't ready for the full layoff (i.e. managers hadn't decided all of who would be laid off), but they wanted to get some momentum going on the stock. /conspiracy

[1]http://www.foxbusiness.com/technology/2014/07/17/memo-from-m...

Some of the cuts have already come. Unfortunately, two of my friends at MSFT have already been given notice. They're bright, talented people and they'll be fine long run, but it's devastating in the short term since they've worked very hard, gotten good reviews, and essentially just rolled poorly on their saving throw vs disaster.

For those interested, the WARN page now shows that 1351 employees will be laid off in Redmont.

Interesting, if you sort by the "# of Workers" column [1], it looks like this is the 2nd-largest layoff in the state in the past 10 years. The largest was 3400 workers being laid off by Washington Mutual following its bankruptcy (2009). Third-largest was another Microsoft layoff round, of 1200 (also in 2009). Although in 2009, Microsoft had two layoff rounds only a few months apart, and those would add up to ~2100 workers if you combine them.

[1] http://www.esd.wa.gov/newsandinformation/warn/

predominately from hardware division across india and china(nokia), sad :(

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