#leadership

He is explaining how he has reignited growth of an old fashioned industrial giant.

With last week's layoffs, how is the morale of the interns and ldp? I heard they had to sit through speeches by chris flood on leadership and culture already....

You can’t have a “market-based culture” unless you’re actually willing to compete in the market for talent. Stinky keeps talking about building a market-based culture, but what exactly is market-based about AT&T?

Companies with true high-performance cultures usually have at least one thing going for them:

• They pay top of market.
• They offer benefits people actually want like WFH/Hybrid
• They attract top-tier talent.
• They have a culture or reputation that makes people want to work there.

AT&T has… what?… The pay is mediocre and below market. The benefits have all been stripped away. Five-day RTO makes recruiting new young talent even harder. The culture and morale is at rock bottom. Leadership approval is about as low as I’ve ever seen it… Ask around outside of work how many people would recommend AT&T to someone starting their career. That answer speaks for itself.

John wants a market-based culture while offering a rock bottom value proposition.

People work hard in tech because the compensation is worth it. People grind in finance because one bonus can change their life. People put in insane hours at companies like Google because the pay, experience, and name on the resume can open doors for the rest of their careers.

So what’s the pitch for AT&T here, John?… Move across the country, come into the office five days a week, accept weak compensation, lose all flexibility, work under constant scrutiny and monitoring… Why would a top performer choose that?

The only reason anyone is still here is because the job market has been weak. As soon as it turns, and it always does, the people who have options will use them.

That’s how markets work, Stank. People won’t forget how you treated them when a better opportunity knocks.

If leadership really believes in a market-based culture, then they need to start offering a market-based reason for people to stay.

What he said in the ATG live really pi---d me off and changed my mind. I wasn’t going to take it, but now I will.

I’d rather blast leadership in the survey again than sit it out. If nothing else, it’ll force them to confront the exact same feedback they’ve been hearing for the last couple of years. Now, whether they choose to listen is another story, but at least it will signal nothing has changed.

If the people who are frustrated don’t participate, then all that’s left are the people who think everything is fine. That paints a completely false picture, and I’m not willing to let that happen.

The survey only has value if people answer honestly. If leadership doesn’t like the results, maybe the problem isn’t the employees giving the feedback, maybe it’s the reason for the feedback itself.

Silence changes nothing. Honest feedback at least gives them the choice to either address the problems again or explain, once again, why they think everyone else is wrong.

We all know that FIS is working hard to get sold to other company.
When that eventually happens then Executives will get millions of dollars as bonuses.

Why to work such company where there are no growth prospects. The leadership is looking for own "get quick rich" route.

There are more layoffs expected in FA , FMW. Lots of leaders are to be thrown out. VP's, Directors.

I see that one of our key AI leaders/strategists Prag is jumping ship to another bank.
Several other key tech leaders have left this last year and usually aren't been replaced by external talent.

Is all this a bad sign?

Decreasing bureaucracy would make sense if the people left had basic knowledge of systems. As the staff has been critically cut simple repair jobs take days instead of hours. AI cannot replace hands. We should have executed a paced transition plan to execute instead of cutting first and figuring out later. This is proof senior leadership has no clue on how the systems function. They want the people left to come up with a solution and sell AI to support the theme

HCSC is now being managed by Manika and others with some ideology that they are bent on. It is not business. It is ideology. Maurice was an incrediblely smart business person back in the day, but he too has succumbed to this cr-p. Hcsc used to be the best of the Blues. No longer.

As per some speculations, FIS was bought out private equity firm. But deal did not go through as the current executive team asked for 500 million bonus payoff.
The board and buyer was willing to pay 200 million. Each Leadership team member would have received 10 to 25 million bonus, but they were adamant for at least 25 - 50 million each.

Finally the buyer took the deal off the table.

A few analysts were recently let go. Seems like C&S Ohio is dying a slow death ever since MMP and DSNP have gone away. We were told it was due to the business like they were supporting was basically dead? I am assuming that was DSNP. MMP has been gone for several months now. The speculation rumor mill is that these analysts had been there quite a while and were probably making good money so they let them go to save money. I dont know if it was random or if the leadership all conjour together and figure out who they can let go. Its very interesting that not one leadership person in Ohio was effected by losing MMP. One person left but they just went to the national line of business. Never trust any of these people in leadership. They are not your friend. They are all out for themselves and they get together to discuss who to keep and who not to keep. I would be very wary in Ohio C&S especially if you make good money. If you arent making good money you are probably safe because you dont effect the budget at all. Stay vigilant out there! Always have an updated resume.

Seriously, is Factset opening nee leadership positions for senior folks from Citi and JPMorgan? All these positions will cost 7 figures each, while we have constant layoffs.
BS’s email this morning had a byline for each of the new positions and it was nothing but fluff. Are we a just jobs program for old friends of BS and SV?

AT&T and TMO are also up. Look at the history of these telecom stocks. They go up when the other equities go down due to market risks increasing (wars, rising oil, etc.). Grandma clutches her pearls tighter and moves her money to utilities. She'll move it out of telecom when she thinks the risk is less, and VZ will then continue it's slide.

AT&T stock gains 5% today due to increased RTO and confidence in CEO Stankey's leadership going forward

Dan talked about eliminating bureaucracy and said communication below Band 5 isn’t flowing effectively.

The reality is that nothing will change unless the organization is truly flattened. My organization just went through a massive reorg, and I still have two layers of Band 6 management above me—even though I’m also a Band 6 employee.

If leadership is serious about reducing bureaucracy, the conversation can’t stop at messaging. It has to include eliminating the excessive layers between individual contributors and the executive team.

Also I want to know what AD will do differently than D and Sr. Director.

Innovation doesn’t die because people run out of ideas.

It dies when meetings replace making.

When every experiment needs five approvals.

When PowerPoint or Keynote become more valuable than prototypes.

When politics outrank curiosity.

When protecting careers matters more than questioning assumptions.

When “alignment” becomes code for “don’t rock the boat.”

The irony is that the companies famous for disrupting industries often become experts at preserving the status quo.

You can hire the world’s best designers, engineers, and creatives, but if they’re rewarded for managing risk instead of creating value, don’t be surprised when innovation turns into theater.

Real innovation is messy. It creates tension. It challenges leaders. It makes some people uncomfortable.

If everyone in the room agrees, you’re probably not innovating—you’re just documenting consensus.

The biggest threat to innovation isn’t a lack of talent.

It’s bureaucracy wearing an innovation badge.

#Innovation #Leadership #ProductDevelopment #DesignThinking #CorporateCulture #Engineering #Creativity

Cuts in Engineering, and now office closures?
Austin, LA, and now Charlotte. What is happening in this company?

Layoffs and office closures are not the best signs for a “growth” company despite how CEO frames it.

The message should come from ELT/CEO …not head of facility/office manager.

As someone who wasn’t affected by this transformation, I find this little gathering cold and heartless.

The photo op from the smiling executive team is like pouring salt into an open wound.

Didn’t they admit morale was low? This event and subsequent post in the company feed does not help.

Zero emotional intelligence.

It looks like leadership announcements are starting to happen in the US downstream. More to come???

Hey MW and Executive Leadership,

Man up and address the turmoil and stress you all have caused the company since 2020. Employees are exhausted and morale has hit rock bottom and is still trying to dig lower. Bring some kind of positivity for employees and remember the country and people who have made Chevron successful in its long tenure. Offshoring is not patriotic or right. You have to have some bit of good voice left in your soul. Use SETH to right some wrongs and grow a spine.

Regarding the layoffs at Centene Corp., the real problem is management, not the boots-on-the-ground employees. There are too many layers of unnecessary management pulling in great salaries. Middle management is mediocre and exclusively focused on metrics and numbers, which is the exact reason we lost so many members—because the resulting quality is deficient and mediocre.

How can anyone focus on quality and caring for the member when they are forced to handle 60 calls daily, just trying to reach that arbitrary quota of 60 members a day? Leadership thinks that because they have a Microsoft pilot, everything is fixed, yet CM Hero remains an outdated piece of trash. I cannot fathom how much they paid for that imbecile piece of software that they are trying to promote.

The issue stems straight from middle management, where there is zero innovation. Moreover, when you look at the staffing mix—such as registered nurses with only two years of college and CNAs—can you expect them to think above and beyond? Many of them do not write English properly, which is plainly evident in the notes that they produce.

I've been at the bank long enough, and in enough different roles, to finally understand how the place actually rewards performance.

The reward for hard work isn't recognition. It isn't career growth. It isn't additional compensation. It's more work.

Not just any work, either. You get handed the complex, politically sensitive, high-risk initiatives that everyone else has quietly managed to avoid. The kind of work where failure has consequences, success is expected, and if you somehow pull it off, leadership thanks you by immediately assigning you the next impossible project.

Competence isn't rewarded here, it's exploited.

The irony is that the less capable you appear to be, the less you're expected to do. People who consistently fail to deliver, miss deadlines, or spend more time trying to hand off work than actually completing it somehow develop an impressive track record of failing upward. They become experts at managing perception instead of outcomes, while the people actually producing results are too busy carrying the organization to spend time marketing themselves.

Then there are the teams that seem to have won the organizational lottery. Small teams. Clearly defined responsibilities. Minimal scope creep. Leadership that actually protects their capacity instead of treating it like a public utility. Flexible delivery timelines. Dedicated administrative support. They get measured on exactly what they signed up to do.

The rest of us? Apparently our job description is simply "everything else." Need another critical program? Give it to the team that's already drowning. Another governance function? They'll figure it out. Production support? Add it. Executive requests? Sure. Regulatory deadlines? Why not? Twenty-four-hour operational oversight? Of course. After all, they've always found a way before.

Then leadership has the audacity to act surprised when capacity becomes an issue. The best part is pretending this is all accidental. It isn't.

Leadership has the reporting. They have the staffing numbers. They have the capacity plans. They sit through prioritization meetings. They review resource models. They approve organizational structures. They know exactly which teams have half the support and two or three times the responsibility. They know which groups are expected to supervise critical operations 24 hours a day, 365 days a year while simultaneously delivering strategic initiatives.

They're not uninformed. They're informed enough to know exactly what's happening and comfortable enough to let it continue. When you escalate the issue, you get the standard corporate script.

"Prioritize better."

"Focus on the highest-value work."

"Be more strategic."

"Challenge your assumptions."

As if no one has ever considered making a priority list.

You can spend weeks documenting workload, mapping every deliverable, demonstrating capacity with actual data, and proving mathematically that there aren't enough hours or people to accomplish everything being demanded. The response?

"We understand."

Translation: We have no intention of changing anything, but we'd appreciate it if you'd continue accomplishing the impossible so we don't have to explain the problem to someone above us.

The most frustrating part is that leadership often mistakes resilience for excess capacity. Every time a team sacrifices nights, weekends, vacations, morale, or retention to somehow meet another impossible deadline, leadership congratulates themselves on successful planning instead of recognizing they've just normalized another unsustainable expectation.

And so the cycle continues.

The competent become the organizational pack mules, carrying increasingly impossible loads because they've demonstrated they can survive them. The underperformers continue to enjoy manageable expectations because no one expects much from them anyway. Meanwhile, leadership points to another successful delivery as proof that the current operating model works, blissfully ignoring that it only works because a handful of people refuse to let the wheels come off.

At some point, you realize the system isn't broken.

It's functioning exactly as leadership designed it.
The people doing the work absorb the cost.
Leadership gets the credit.

And every year, everyone wonders why the people capable of carrying the organization eventually stop volunteering to do it.

Verizon needs to skip Hans/DEI 2.0 and announce Verizon 3.0.

Verizon 3.0 is going back Verizon 1.0 and motivate/reward performance on results and execution. Call Denny Strygal/Ivan.

It's impossible to execute with current Board and C-Suite Team.

Go back to skip levels and ask high owrformers what needs to be done.

Start with VCG groups.. learn why desoite having superior fiber in SFU/MDUs over 25 years.. broadband still under 50%.

Then attack Small Businesx and remove sales friction.

The Vz Culture and lack of empowerment and leadership talent will ensure competition continues to as$ kick Verizon in marketplace.

The only reason for promotion these days, outside of sponsored HiPos, is to replenish the PIP fodder at the bottom of the next CL rank group.

They need new non sponsored persons to focus downward pressure onto.

Why do some announce they are retiring but you can tell it seems forced? Does upper leadership tell these people they are being laid off and then lie to everyone about the real reason? I have seen this in at least 4 people in the last year. At first I thought confidence but it doesn’t make sense, especially with departure date. Anyone have insight? How is it legal to let someone say they are retiring when they are really being laid off?

Commonwealth Financial's chief digital officer has left the company shortly after its acquisition by LPL Financial. This departure follows recent layoffs impacting Commonwealth's back-office staff. While not directly linked, these events are typical after a large-scale merger. The acquisition, valued at $2.7 billion, combined LPL's extensive network with Commonwealth's advisor base. Industry observers note that such shifts in leadership and workforce are common post-acquisition.

https://www.investmentnews.com/independent-broker-dealers/as-layoffs-commence-commonwealths-digital-guru-jumps-ship/267533

AI is not a strategy

Every town hall, they ask us to trust leadership's vision. But vision doesn't pay the bills when half your team gets laid off. We've watched promises get walked back, strategies flip quarterly, and executives cash out while we scramble. So no, I'm done trusting leadership. I think they let us down one time too many for that.

I asked my director about project priorities and he said he'd check with his boss. Three days later, still no answer. It's managers all the way down, and nobody at the top knows anything either.

We keep getting vague emails about stuff like strategic alignment and zero details about layoffs, budgets, or direction. Basically, anything that truly matters. We're at the point where the grapevine is more reliable than any official channel. That's not a management style, that's damage control.

So many rounds of layoffs in just the last 12 months and zero strategic vision, nothing but cost-cutting bandaids. I've watched talented people walk and mediocre ones get promoted, absolutely no logic behind it. My job search started last week, and I'm not looking back.

Frank Bisignano left JPMorgan Chase, one of the nation's largest banks, after complaints about his behavior led the company's CEO to lose trust in him, according to a Wall Street Journal article.

When do we really need to fix the leadershit at this shitTel place to save employee layoffs ?

I am really tired and sick of this

Sad to see a real pep+ leader like RB retiring. She led with passion and knew the business cold. She actually knew her stuff and cared about doing good.

What’s worse is watching her responsibilities go to a complete sycophant of a lady who hasn’t earned it. Giving more power to rotten leadership isn’t just tone-deaf, it shows JA is delusional and has no clue what good leadership looks like.

JA posted on LinkedIn that Exploration is Back! Tell me how because I don’t see it from where I work wells in the upstream…..

Is he still selling pipe dreams so he can retire? Did he ever find anythind?

Saw the note about another sr leaders leaving in service enablement. Kinda makes me think those leaders have a sense of what's to come and are getting out early. Idk, I never was much of a fan of ZK, but kinda makes me nervous all of the people leaving.

head of growth and generosity leaving company, not being replaced. a bunch of people promoted from VP to SVP. in same email, layoffs announced. said this was done in the name of cost reduction yet with all the big title promotions, were there any real dollars saved? it's so tasteless to be rah rah let's celebrate promotions and then tell people they lost their jobs all in the same day.

we can build products, but can execs manage the business?