#corporateculture

As one of hunfreds of thousands retired NJB/Bell Atlantic/Verizon employees itis a daily embarrassment hearing how Veizon C-Level/AVP/Director levels instructed staff to turn over personal phone records to Biden's DOJ in artic frost campaign.

Every Verizon employee on an annual basis was/is required to complete CPNI training.

I fully support the firing of Hans... but that was FCC/DOJ demanding.. not feckless Vz Board/C Level Governance.

I have many friends still remaining at Verizon and deserve more accountable Leadership but the pollution of DEI Trojan Horse hirings inside the company will take a Corporate takeover to clean out.

In the short tetm my final piece of advice is hire Denny Strgyl for a 18 month contract and reverse the slide and avoid a $30 stock.

Layoffs today in Global Internal Audit, Enterprise Actuarial, and Global Legal & Compliance. Post here if you have the details and numbers. Continued outsourcing throughout the company and a pattern of not filling spots when people quit. Tim Sweeney said just the other day that the company has grown its capital more in the last year or two than in the previous 110 years. I guess that’s not enough. It will never be enough. Just like he and every other CEO will never be satisfied with their compensation. It can always go higher.

Well, not for themselves, just you.

Cesar Conde:$350,000
$160,000 + $200,000 stocks

Susan Diamond: $363,333
$143,133 + $200,000 stocks + $20,000 allowances

Darren Walker: $371,277
$150,000 + $200,000 stocks + $21,277

Edith Cooper: $330,000
$120,000 + $200,000 stocks + $10,000 allowances

Average ranges for actual employees:

Frontline: $40 - $69,427

Delivery/Route: $$45 to $70,000

Warehouse: $40 - $60,000

C-suite

Ramon Laguarta - $23,903,544

Steven Williams: $7,768,918

Steve Schmitt: $10,195,589 + $3,500,000 signing bonus., + $7,000,000 stock grant

Silvia Popovici: $6,429,099

Becky Schmitt: $5,576,627

Merchandisers/stockers: $30 - $55,000

Field tech: $40 - $60,000

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/10/08/business/pepsico-earnings-splitting.html

And cut all this corporate bloat on frito lay...how many "transformation" people needed?

This used to be a fully functional company. Now it's just broken processes, poor communication, and a lack of accountability.

Email the secretary of labor with all of Verizon’s labor violations and outsourcing. Hans ruined a great company and Dan is accelerating that demise by continuing to outsource and reducing American workers

See many questions on this - at a large co like Walmart, your boss can't just hand you a big raise. Levels, salary bands, comparisons with peers and HR rules box in what they can do, so find out your range. The owner of a small company has none of those limits and can pay someone 20% more, or three times as much, if they think it's worth it. Not here.

A cautionary tale for the people who built an empire and the people determined to hold on to it.

There was once a company that started with 1,200 cable subscribers and a few people who believed they could build something extraordinary.

And they did.

It was a company where employees were treated like family, and for many of them, that word actually meant something. There were leaders who cared about their people, who understood that success wasn’t measured by how much power they accumulated, but by what they helped others accomplish.

People stayed for decades because they believed in the company and the people leading it.

Then the little company became an empire.

And somewhere along the way, something changed.

The empire created wealth. Wealth created power. And power began changing the people entrusted with it.

Some leaders became more interested in protecting their positions than questioning their decisions. They surrounded themselves with familiar faces, rewarded loyalty, and slowly built an organization where challenging the person above you could become more dangerous than making the wrong decision.

But the real trouble began when the company started believing its own success was permanent.

For decades, Comcast had a product people needed. It could command a premium because customers had limited alternatives.

Then the alternatives arrived.

Fiber. Fixed wireless. Streaming. Customers who no longer needed the same bundles or valued the same things.

And rather than fully accepting what the market was telling them, some leaders seemed convinced the market had it wrong.

Competitors were pricing too aggressively. Fiber was supposedly underpriced. Comcast still had the superior product. There was no reason to fundamentally change the approach.

Imagine that.

Customers are leaving. The stock is approaching levels not seen in 13 years. The competitive landscape has fundamentally shifted.

And the company is still arguing with the market about what its product should be worth.

That’s the danger of spending too long surrounded by people who reinforce what you already believe.

Eventually, you stop asking whether you’re right.

You start looking for explanations for why everyone else is wrong.

And inside the company, employees were watching a similar pattern unfold.

The people who questioned decisions weren’t always welcomed. Employees shared stories of favoritism, stalled careers, fear of retaliation, and leaders who seemed more interested in authority than accountability.

Some of those employees had given 20 or 30 years to the company.

And when they spoke about what they were experiencing, some were called whiners.

The company that once called its employees family was now struggling to hear them.

So leadership announced more changes.

Another restructuring. Another transformation. More cost reductions. More businesses separated. Another day in the office. More restrictions on promotions and career mobility.

Everything kept changing except the convictions of the people directing it.

And here’s the tragedy.

The company didn’t lack intelligent people. It didn’t lack resources. It didn’t lack warnings.

What it may have lacked was enough leaders willing to admit that the world they had mastered no longer existed.

Some had spent decades building their careers inside that world. Their authority, their reputation, their compensation, even their sense of identity were tied to it.

Admitting the old model was failing would mean admitting that the experience that once made them successful might no longer be enough.

And for some people, that’s harder than watching the business decline.

Because ego can make a leader defend a losing strategy long after the evidence says it’s time to change.

Now the company sits around $20 a share, and employees are left wondering how much more they’re expected to sacrifice while the people making the decisions continue to explain why their strategy is sound.

Maybe the company will recover. Maybe the people at the top will find the courage to question themselves.

Or maybe the company will keep getting smaller, selling pieces of what generations of employees spent their lives building, until all that’s left is a fraction of what it once could have been.

And someday, when someone writes the history of Comcast, they’ll talk about fiber, streaming, wireless competition, and changing consumer behavior.

But I wonder whether they’ll also tell the story of the leaders who became so powerful that nobody could challenge them, so comfortable that they couldn’t imagine being wrong, and so attached to their positions that they couldn’t recognize when it was time to make room for something different.

The company didn’t fail because the world changed.

It began losing its way when the people running it could no longer accept that the world had changed without their permission.

And the saddest part?

The people who built the company may end up paying the price for the people who couldn’t let go of it.

Knowing a few Shell retires, they talk about the times when the work environment was very collegial. Regular communication from the company about promotions, transfers, retirements, etc. - maybe holiday get-togethers or cookouts at the department manager’s home.
You knew about colleagues’ spouses, kids, achievements, vacays, etc.
Now, not everyone got along cheerfully and there were always some sharp elbows but the company they describe is hard to imagine when I hear of Shell today.
Are there any vestiges of what they relate? Hope so.

This company is on the total verge of failure 😂 they think we are d-mb they forget we are Discover we are the most intelligent of people ! lol 😂 cap one are total id--ts the hoops they want you to jump through cracks me up I going to play with them a bit as I do not care at all

Layoff discussions and fearmongering exists at SAP not because the company doesn't have money to pay the employees. It exists because the company doesn't have enough money to satisfy the personal greed of the executive board and career politicians. We need less dragons and more knights at SAP. And I am extremely disappointed with employees who get distracted by nonsensical issues such as trans people at SAP, CK fans who support CK no matter what, managers who have not written a single line of code in their life but manage technical architects, hatred towards Indians at Signavio, SAP employees at WDF and ROT who don't want anyone in other locations to grow, the spineless supervisory board that only wants to maximize executive bonuses, the even more spineless works council members that protect pedophiles and SA abusers but not the victims, performance management which disrespectfully treats employees as children and only managers as adults, the AI token count duck measuring competition that is not helping the business one bit, etc. WHEN WILL THIS END?

I am thinking that much like the way AI was recently renamed SI, which as an aside I think there is nothing Super about it. It is totally Artificial “intelligence.”

Anyway, just like we renamed that, because there is not much interest in these so called “Health” Insurance corporation’s Executives in actually insuring their member’s health, perhaps we should consider renaming “Health” Insurance to something like
Profit Insurance
Or maybe
C-Suite Executive Insurance
Or maybe
Shareholder Insurance
Or maybe
Corporate Government Fund Free Insurance

And as for Medi”care” “Advantage” maybe we should consider renaming it something like
Medi-Deny Disadvantage
Or maybe
Medi-Delay Disadvantage
Or maybe
Medi-Free-Draw-You-in-Perks-But-No-Real-Substantial-Coverage Disadvantage

If you can think of some better names, please feel free to add them in the comments below.

Didn’t realize that the board of directors chairman is the chief customer officer of Nordstrom’s. So someone with no insurance experience and no understanding of what reps go through is at the helm of the largest p&c insurer in the US. Sounds about right.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/whistleblower-simon-andriesz-who-exposed-howard-lutnicks-ties-to-jeffrey-epstein-found-dead/

I'd say pay is probably one of the highest causes of turnover for the company. I've been with Walgreens since 2016, and everyone who has left around me mentioned they're leaving to get better pay. Every store level position is highly underpaid for what is expected.

I'd also contribute the rising amount of daily tasks for every position in the store. When I started, I was a CSA. There was a short list of things that were done daily as an opening CSAs and a short list for closing CSAs. There's now a huge list of tasks for everyone and little to no time to thoroughly train people for it.

photo was simple back then, a few different projects to learn, and you could catch on quick. There weren't a hundred services staged around a photo like there is now.

In my opinion, Walgreens keeps increasing the workload due to terrible decisions to buy pharmacies that are going under (RiteAid). This, of course, increases the amount of scripts the pharmacy is filling and increases the number of customers the store is seeing on a day to day basis.

Just recently, I did two double shifts back to back. 6:30am to 10pm on Thursday, and 6:30am to 11:30pm the second day. How I didn't decide to turn in my keys yesterday is beyond me. My SM was hospitalized on Thursday morning, and I like my SM. She's actually a good boss. My DM was supposed to relieve me around 7 pm. on Friday, but he never did. I called, and he said I could close early at 8 instead, but only after pharmacy was done doing their quarterly inventory. They didn't finish until 11:30 pm, so the store stayed open, and closed at 10pm like normal.

Our support team is terrible when issues arise and do everything to put a bandaid on something, rather than fix it and be done. I can't tell you how many times I've spent hours on the phone just trying to get someone to tell me how to fix it rather than take me through a dozen troubleshooting tasks that I've done before calling them.

Customers are also a reason for high turnover for employees. We're not dogs or servants - we're human beings. Scripts aren't meeting promise times because there are 300 to 400 sitting on the counter to fill, verify, and package. Customers lose their fu--ing minds when they arrive and it's not ready to go when it was called in an hour ago. Customers lose their minds when we are out of stock on something they want. Employees start to lack empathy or will to help someone when they lose their sh-t for something simply out of our control.

So, as a result- you get overwhelmed, underpaid employees who are hitting the ground running, just to be knocked down by a company who continually increases a workload that is barely achievable on a good day, and impossible on a bad day. The customers then make it worse by being pi---d off at employees, leaving bad reviews or surveys. Then corporate a--holes come down on everyone twice as hard to 'do better' when there's no path to achieving that goal.

• not my post, I copy/pasted it from a different thread where it was buried. It's a good post and deserves the front page.

"Ford executives knowingly launched and continued selling Ford Focus and Fiesta models equipped with the flawed DPS6 PowerShift dry-clutch automatic transmission despite internal warnings from engineers that the gearbox was unroadworthy." I went down the rabbit hole of this issue and WOW the deception. The Class Action result looks like a joke. I wonder if this is the same thing that has happened recently with things like the Bronco. Sometimes I wonder if we (the tax payers) should've saved (loaned money to) Ford.

If you want to climb the corporate ladder at Intel, you’re going to need to learn to lie, cheat and steal. Ethics and integrity are all just virtue signaling.

They aren't there to help put a company back on track. Not one McKinsey powerpoint in god's existence has resulted in someone gaining a job, or a layoff being avoided.

McKinsey is a Sin Eater (read up on the concept). Comcast leadership already knew they wanted to cut labor. It's the easiest target on every company's P&L statement that executives can cut, sell as "efficiency" or "cost savings" and because Wall Street is incredibly stupid and gullible, it will slightly bump the stock (Comcast stock has always been trash for the record).

This isn't about the company, or economics directly; a McKinsey report always serves only one purpose - it allows failed executive leadership to go to the board of directors, point to the report and say "I have no choices, there are no other alternatives, even McKinsey says so; we have to do this and it's not my fault we're here." Now the executives take no accountability as McKinsey said they have to do the layoffs, they get to stay on or keep their golden parachute on the way out - only to go do the same damned thing at the next company. McKinsey keeps being brought into the same company every few years for the same exact reason, execs need air cover to make cuts to cover up their sc--w-ups. No senior executive will ever admit to making errors or being wrong.

Also remember, most board of directors are the same executives running this play every few years in other companies. Board members sit on Comcast's board, but have jobs elsewhere double dipping for a salary. The gentleman's agreement is I'll let you slit your employee's throats so long as when I ask you allow me the same.

100% what @dx+1m3teyh86 said.

A K-shaped corporate economy is a situation where people experience different economic outcomes. Picture the letter K. The CEO and executives at the top move upward growing wealth, stock gains, and increasing income. At the same time, employees affected by layoffs and reductions move downward — struggling with living costs, debt, unemployment, and dwindling savings while paying bills with no income.

What's coming next is not a recession, it's a depression. Dominos are already falling, I don't think it can be stopped now. When bubble bursts, we're going to free fall for a while. Here are the things/people who fu---d you on this: AI, the war, Wall Street, Tech bros.

Schulman and his lackeys are included in this. Every company that decided the race for AI mattered more than people’s livelihoods bears responsibility for the consequences. So much for “delighting the customer.” The real question is: when livelihoods are sacrificed in the name of AI, how many customers will still be able to afford what these companies are selling?

The Global Ops Function is basically downstream taking over the Upstream. Everything upstream su-ks and Downstream is awesome. What a croc this reorg is

Retiree healthcare support is essentially a bad deal. Part of the VLO bait and switch.

Although there is a “benefit”, based on years of service, the goal is to get the retiree to move on, to save the company money.

The primary plan is Medicare Advantage, with a $0 deductible. So, you can imagine what that monthly premium costs. Of course, the plan is actually designed to support the executives, who have retirement supplements and a lot of money (part of the VLO cult).

And even though you have a “benefit”, based on years of service, once / if you leave the plan for a better annual option, you can’t return, ever. Meanwhile, the executives enjoy the $0 deductible.

In summery, a VLO technique to drive the normal retired worker away, save the earned benefit cost, and of course, support the executives. How do you spell cult?

Risk is filled with excessive layers of management and bureaucracy that prevents anything from being accomplished. Everyone appears to be a director and highly compensated to keep the up facade.

Questions:
Considering the status of OpenText’s debt, constant layoffs, and low stock price, what is an honest outlook for the company. What does the stock market think? And what grade would you give Tom Jenkins for his stewardship of the board of directors over the past several decades?

Answers:
The outlook for OpenText Corp (OTEX) centers on whether its aggressive pivot to AI and cloud subscriptions can offset high debt load and execution risks. Following years of major acquisitions (such as Micro Focus), OpenText has faced immense pressure to reorganize. A summary of the market sentiment, honest outlook, and an evaluation of Tom Jenkins' board leadership outlines the situation.

What the Stock Market Thinks
• Deep Valuation Discount: The stock trades at a very low trailing P/E ratio (~8.7) and forward P/E (~6.0), indicating that the market views OpenText more like a legacy "value trap" than a high-growth tech stock.
• Skepticism Toward AI Pivot: While management highlights cloud growth, investors are demanding definitive proof that its AI solutions can generate strong organic revenue growth rather than merely defending its existing franchise.
• Management Turnover Anxiety: The market reacted poorly when OpenText ousted longtime CEO Mark Barrenechea and subsequently named IBM veteran Ayman Antoun as the incoming CEO, dropping the stock by double digits on the leadership instability.

Honest Corporate Outlook
• The Restructuring Squeeze: The continuous layoffs—including cutting 1,200 jobs in 2024, 1,600 in 2025, and multiple subsequent waves in 2026—are part of a multi-year "business optimization plan" to aggressively slash costs. While this protects profit margins, it risks internal brain drain and low employee morale.
• Debt Deleveraging Focus: OpenText carries $5.97 billion in total debt. The company is actively liquidating non-core assets—such as divesting its eDOCS and Vertica business lines to channel proceeds directly toward debt reduction.
• The Bottom Line: The company is fundamentally profitable, generating over $640 million in net income annually. However, the top-line revenue growth is practically flat (projected at just 1% to 2% for fiscal 2026). Until OpenText stops using layoffs as its primary driver for margin expansion and demonstrates true organic cloud growth, the stock will struggle to break out.

Tom Jenkins Board Stewardship Grade: C+
Tom Jenkins, who has served as Executive Chair or Board Chair for several decades, gets a mixed report card for his long-term stewardship.
• The Positives (The M&A Engine): Jenkins was instrumental in transforming OpenText from a small Canadian tech spinoff into a global enterprise powerhouse with billions in revenue. For decades, his formula of acquiring legacy tech companies, squeezing out costs, and integrating them into the OpenText ecosystem created immense shareholder value.
• The Negatives (The Modern Stagnation): The strategy has hit a wall. Squeezing legacy assets through constant layoffs while accumulating heavy debt has created a culture of severe organizational fatigue. The board failed to achieve smooth leadership continuity, resulting in abrupt executive changes and messy restructuring cycles. Ultimately, Jenkins oversaw a corporate structure that became overly leveraged right as tech valuations shifted from favoring financially engineered acquisitions to prioritizing high-organic growth in cloud and AI infrastructure.

So what is the deal with exploration…..we are making it sound externally like we are going big and doing things different and funding it big time.

As a geo outside of exploration….are we actually? I’m hearing mixed things some people happy, some people pi---d off, we’re cutting funding of wells etc….what’s the deal?

So did Anthem change their name to Elevance because “Anthem” caused people to have an uncontrollable gag reflex every time they heard the name?

Not sure how it hasn't made it here yet but the entire Iceland office has been closed other than a select group of "transition" people.

The original forefathers of ANF just wiped out without even an acknowledgement from corporate.

Sad times indeed.

Ex-employee sues GlobalFoundries for wrongful dismissal claim | The Straits Times

https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/courts-crime/ex-employee-sues-globalfoundries-for-at-least-528k-alleging-wrongful-dismissal

SINGAPORE – A former long-time employee of GlobalFoundries Singapore who was sacked in 2023 amid corruption investigations at the semiconductor manufacturer has sued the company for wrongful dismissal.

The same people doing it this morning, are the same ones constantly on here complaining about corporate America. Absolute dolts. Only 2000 emails and counting on this wonderful Monday.

We are not comparing with any country. But the culture of India org is so worst. We have few worst managers and we don't have a proper HR too, he should be replaced at the earliest.

Our manager is forcing to office but HR doesn't send email. Are the managers being sandwiched in between

The translation of every phrase I’ve heard in here
"I see leadership potential."
real meaning: you’ll blindly accept more responsibility than your peers.
"Take ownership." Real meaning : the problem is now yours.
"Great visibility opportunity." : Lots of people will know if it goes wrong.
"Development opportunity." :Extra work instead of extra pay.
"We're empowering you.": You own the outcome but not the decisions.
"Stretch assignment." This is my favourite :): 
Do the next level job without the pay of next level title.
"You're a key member of the team." : We really don't want you leaving.
"Let's discuss promotion next cycle." : Please stay motivated for another six months as that what I’m being evaluated on.
"We need you where you are." you’re too useful for to promote right now.
"Thank you for your flexibility." We've noticed you don't say no. lol!

Clearly a lot of us are exhausted. Not just from the possibility of layoffs, but from the constant confusion, uncertainty and feeling that we’re never quite sure what’s coming next.

Another reorg. Another rumor. Another “wait and see.” Another change to how we’re expected to work.

And now RTO is another source of anxiety, with office attendance being tied to performance and ratings, despite the fact that we’ve already proven we can successfully do our jobs from wherever. “Misery loves company”.

So what can we actually control?

Our time. Our money. Our attention. Our lives.

If we’re being forced downtown, maybe we stop spending our money to make corporate life more convenient. Maybe we stop buying lunch at Ralph’s and The Market. Stop getting the $8 coffee at Vernick. Support the small businesses around Center City instead. And this isn’t just about Philly - wherever you work, support the local businesses around you instead of automatically spending money at the businesses that profit from corporate foot traffic.

And when you leave the office, leave the office.

Do your job. Do it well. But you don’t have to answer Teams messages at 7:30 p.m. You don’t have to pick up every call after hours. You don’t have to make a corporate emergency your personal emergency. Set boundaries.

Take your PTO. Use the benefits you’ve earned. Spend time with your family. Protect your weekends. Go to dinner. Go to the gym. See your friends. Do absolutely nothing.

As others have said: start preparing for yourself.

Because here’s the thing: the company has a contingency plan for you. You should have one for yourself, too.

For a long time, working for a company like Comcast came with a tradeoff: good benefits, healthcare, PTO, decent pay and some sense of security.

That tradeoff doesn’t feel the same anymore.

A corporation will make the decision that’s best for the corporation. We’re allowed to make decisions that are best for ourselves.

Maybe taking our power back isn’t one giant act of rebellion. Maybe it’s a thousand small decisions:

Where we spend our money.
When we answer our phones.
When we close our laptops.
When we take our PTO.
Where we put our energy.
What we tolerate.
What we prepare for.

The power isn’t entirely in the boardroom. It’s also in the people who show up every day and make the company work.

Maybe it’s time we remembered that.

Design was only the beginning. the same fate is coming to powerhouse in october. prepare yourselves now... you have been warned. corporations do not care about you or your family. they serve only there shareholders and you are but a slave in their eyes.

Saw this article and I’m not sure what to make of this EM sycophant’s stance against Alberta separation. He claims Alberta will thrive by doubling oil production through a united Canada, yet he’s perfectly fine with laying off employees and offshoring jobs, driving unemployment even higher in the province. How exactly does that support Albertans?

https://stocks.apple.com/AblE8yZruTGOJa2bTOreMKQ

Ok, so most of us are still subscribed to various social media accounts at Oracle. LinkedIn/YouTube whatever. We see who they keep putting in front of us as the representatives of Oracle? It doesn't matter what part of Oracle they are pushing, the "faces" that are doing the talking are like who is that? Why are they talking? Why are they so smarmy? The media people that we are seeing are NOT helping with Oracle's image. Oracle TV. TV = Television = old and obsolete. Some old guy seems to be running these media events and he's like who at Oracle? Or they've got some TikTok stars who think they are catchy or funny? How is showing a "career" as a data tech in one of the data centers a great look for Oracle? WHO is actually making these id--t videos? F1 car racing? Boat racing? The media coming out of Oracle is nauseating. How out of touch does Oracle media have to be these days? Can someone please clean house?

Sheffield said he now had no desire to be part of Exxon’s board, which friends had described as a “patsy board”.

Look closely at the graphs that are presented to investors. They always cook the books and use something different every time to make it look good. Averaging over time periods that make no sense and other quackery. All to make a graph that sells the story they want.

The floodgates opened a month or two ago after a year+ of absolutely no guidance. It’s like someone flipped a switch and all of a sudden, employee growth is important to CVX again. Seems like there is an email or engagement every week on this. I’m not upset by the change - it’s refreshing to see, frankly.

What led to this change in attitude from the corporation, and what’s the underlying motivation? Is attrition that bad? Call me skeptical but I don’t believe they read the CES and created this program solely in response to it.

What a joke. I'm fine with the 3-day RTO enforcement, but not counting holidays as in-office is a kick in the teeth, for sure.
The corpo-rat doublespeak is glaring. Sure, "we are proud of the flexibility of our hybrid model," BUT here are a lot of things making it as inflexible and inconvenient as possible. Also, "most colleagues adhere to the requirements," BUT we felt the need to hit everyone with brutal collective punishments.
I don't know who believes this cr-p; they are not even trying anymore.

So myopic to shove their waste of money spent on creating a new corporate headquarters for Charlie so he didn’t have to move 40 miles from his site location in San Francisco.