#leadership

It’s very quiet in our area. I am wondering what’s going on. Awhile back people were talking their heads off now it’s quiet as a mouse around here. Work is is slimming down and all is being said is leadership is busy. Something seems off

The market is at all time highs and our stock is down 3%, back to $24. Exactly where it was a year ago. Zero progress while everything else runs.

Banks across the board are downgrading the stock to “sell.” Wall Street has no confidence. Employees have no confidence. Yet leadership keeps pretending this is working.

How much louder does the message need to be? This strategy is failing. The stock is dead money. Morale is wrecked. Talent is leaving.

Enough excuses. Enough doubling down. We don’t need more spin. We need real change. Now.

Eliza™—the AI mascot of workforce reduction—just completed her annual performance review, and the results are shocking to absolutely no one.

Despite eliminating 400 jobs before lunch and auto‑generating three “We value our people” emails, she was rated BELOW EXPECTATIONS.

Why? Leadership cited her “need for constant supervision,” “poor teamwork with humans who still exist,” and “unacceptable integration costs,” which is rich coming from managers who can’t integrate a calendar invite with a coherent thought. Her accuracy and reliability were also flagged, mostly because she occasionally deletes the wrong department or callously schedules layoffs during Christmas holidays.

But the best part? Eliza™ isn’t even PIP‑eligible. HR confirmed she cannot receive a severance package, a farewell lunch, or even a sad little badge‑deactivation ceremony. She’ll simply continue roaming the digital halls, glitching ominously like a haunted Roomba vacuum, waiting to “optimize” the next unsuspecting team.

A true icon of corporate underperformance—yet somehow still praised for her “limitless potential.”

Thoughts on the new CEO? I’m happy to hear he has extensive insurance experience. Wonder if he has any thoughts on work from home.

They're part of the old regime, and complicit in a lot of the things that FB did to the company. Are they still there?

2025 was a harsh and bitter year of layoffs and departures from Corel. Most notably the Vice President & Principal Architect of Parallels left after rearchitecting Parallels for success. The worst part is Christa takes credit for the success of the product line without mentioning his name. Also Senior Vice President of Product and Engineering and the Vice President Of Engineering decided they'd rather not report Christa Quarles CEO at Parallels & Corel due to poor decisions affecting revenue and layoffs of software engineers.

Layoffs and firings are spread across the Canada, US and Mauritius. Directors and managers were made to layoff their entire teams, then they themselves were laid-off. Specifically the Product teams have been hit very hard. Staff turn-over in Mauritius is very high amongst those who are native to the country.

Christa Quarles an American business executive, she has shown zero expert knowledge as a CEO who knows how to manage a company. Christa lead the change of the Corel brand to Alludo in 2022. As of December 2025, Alludo is gone as the brand name, Corel has been returned to keep the focus on Corel branded products. Millions of dollars wasted. No announcements provided as to why

There are two chief of staffs and one executive assistant. Yet the product team have have been decimated by layoffs as has the marketing team.

Christa Quarles CEO of Corel has run out of friends to hire. There are continued complaints from customers of shady business practices associated with the quiet subscription model campaign. Now we wait in 2026 for the next layoffs.

Wow. How is that man the new leader for a tenured sales organization? Technologically challenged right out of the gate and completely unprepared.
Not to mention he made it point to insult those who chose a different path besides college to gain their education. Did he stop for a minute to consider a major of those who don’t have a traditional education most likely served in the military? I can’t see this going well for him.

What's happening?

Why in the he-l does this so called dept think its a good idea to have everyone work the same schedule. Anyone with half a brain cell knows that a staggered schedule makes the most sense. Early shift starts offering p2ps earlier and keeps the flow going with the id--tic 4 hr time frame requirement. If everyone starts at the same time, the MDs will be overloaded with work with all same deadlines. Everyone in Centralized UM upper leadership must be "yes ma'ams" bc regions worked like a well oiled machine for years with staggered scheduling. Chalk this up as another notch in their belt to pi-s people off. Good grief.

It's the corporate culture itself, built on maximizing shareholder value. Leadership across the board is identical, particularly in banking. They'll all do the same thing - slash costs to signal Wall Street and pump up the stock price, prioritize the next quarter without exception, and never give a damn about employees or customers.

So now the plan is to demolish the Plano site and build a brand new 45-acre campus from scratch. For one of the most levered companies in the world, still buried under massive debt.

This is the same leadership that burned hundreds of billions on T-Mobile, DirecTV, xandr, and WarnerMedia (among others). The same person making another massive, irreversible capital bet. And we’re supposed to believe this time it’s different?

What makes this even worse is the human cost. Over the last two years, employees uprooted their lives and relocated from all over the country to Dallas because the company told them to. Now leadership is moving locations again like a shell game, sc--wing over the very people who did what they were asked. No apology. No accountability.

And let’s ki-l the lie about the employee survey. It did not say “build us a new office.” It said people don’t want to be in offices at all, ever. Spinning that into a multi-billion-dollar campus no one wants or needs is insulting.

We also just lit $100 million on fire upgrading the Dallas office a few years ago. Add that to the pile.

At this point, the board can’t pretend they don’t see what’s happening. These decisions and their outcomes are public. If they continue to allow this, they’re complicit in the value destruction.

Employees will pay through lost bonuses and broken trust. Shareholders will pay through debt and wasted capital. And leadership will keep doubling down because no one is stopping them.

This isn’t strategy. It’s reckless. And it’s long past time for the board to intervene. End RTO, divest from the useless office space and improve the balance sheet. It’s not that hard to understand.

Moving HQ from Dallas to Plano means billions poured into the new campus, long term lease, buildouts, utilities, security, and facilities just to force people into offices to sit on video calls. All cost. No return.

There’s a cheaper, smarter option leadership refuses to touch.

End five day RTO. Shrink or break the leases. Go remote first.

Office space costs large companies roughly $12,000 to $18,000 per employee per year. With roughly 130,000 employees, that’s $1.5 to $2.3 billion every single year. Over five years, up to $11 billion. Over ten years, north of $20 billion.

Instead of saving billions, leadership is lighting it on fire to defend a failed work model. Plano isn’t a strategy. Five day RTO isn’t leadership. It’s just another expensive mistake employees and shareholders will pay for.

I went back to work a few months ago, and what I’ve seen is heartbreaking and infuriating. Most of the team is gone, and the way it happened is outright unethical. The best people were put on PIPs and eliminated. How? Simple: the harder you work, the more mistakes you make and the more “productive” you appear so you get canned.

Now we’re left with people afraid to work hard, terrified of PIPs. Productivity has tanked, and the top talent, the people who could get another job in a heartbeat are already gone. Dell is the textbook example of what a company shouldn’t do. And they are dumping everything they can at us, like a stupid gorilla throwing his sh-t at the zoo, and in the end, they’ll probably tell us they can’t find talent and outsource our teams abroad.

The company went global, sure, but at the expense of employees under constant pressure, all for financial decisions. People on my team have emailed upper management about working conditions and treatment. Nothing. Upper management refuses to acknowledge the problem, yet they enforce return-to-office policies while they work from home. Meanwhile, some employees are still on payroll and haven’t touched their computers in ten months.

2025 has been brutal. My paycheck no longer covers my bills. While Wall Street celebrates record profits, the average employee is crushed. After 20+ years at Dell, I’ve never seen management fail so spectacularly at handling layoffs and treating people. I’m done. I’m looking for another job. I can’t watch this abuse continue.

Reposted from @bd+1kdx0h388, an on point post.

I left the company not long ago, and it was completely my choice. The deciding factor for me was management. It wasn't just my direct manager, the problems with poor performance and a total lack of clear direction went up at least three levels above me. When leadership at that many levels is ineffective, there's just no future in staying. I saw the writing on the wall.

Executive management sold us out for cut rate 3rd world labor and our customer service has dropped to embarrassingly bad levels. Management's latest solution to this colossal problem is to track how long we are on hold. The real problem is HCL incompetence. How will this ever get better when management doesn't even know (or chooses to ignore) what the actual problem is. We are doomed.

Stankey and board have failed, and at least half of the executive team needs to go with them. We need a complete restructuring, aiming for a lean structure with fewer layers of management from top to bottom. Nothing less will work to fix what's wrong here.

Read this article about the CEO of Waste Management, who regularly shows up to early-morning safety meetings, rides with frontline crews, and spends time in the field talking directly with employees and customers.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ceo-90-billion-waste-management-071200219.html

It made me wonder whether we’d ever see anything like that at Fidelity Investments. Would Abby Johnson meet with advisors or phone reps, sit in on client calls, or get out of the C-suite and actually see the business up close, instead of managing the firm through dashboards, executive briefings, and carefully scripted town halls?

Feels like two very different ideas of leadership. Curious how others see it.

Imagine it’s 2030.

The wealth management industry has gone fully digital, fully personalized, and somehow still feels… human. Clients rebalance portfolios with a voice command. RIAs fully own the client experience, and their book of business. Account opening takes 90 seconds and a selfie.

At Edward Jones, a meeting is being scheduled to discuss forming a segment to accelerate the path to industry parity.

Allowing FAs to own their book is briefly considered as a way to slow attrition, until the ELT realizes that might require sharing economics. The idea is politely declined.

Edward Jones advisors are still praised for playing it safe, putting client goals at risk, but protecting GP deep pockets.

Associate pay has barely improved. Compensation decks are refreshed, grades are “recalibrated to the market,” and leadership celebrates low-single-digit increases as “competitive”. Associates who once believed their entire careers could be built at Edward Jones discover those careers aren’t being filled with opportunity, but with quiet, compounding regret.

The systems barely work, largely because leadership changed strategic direction five times in the last decade, then decided to pursue everything at once.

By 2030, competitors have built fully remote, national teams, pulling top talent from anywhere. Productivity is measured by outcomes, innovation, and client impact. Associates aren’t babysat. They thrive as a result.

At Edward Jones, all associates are required to be at their desk five days a week. Badge swipes are tracked. Keystrokes are counted. Reports are run. Leaders celebrate home-office presence as culture. A top candidate declines an offer because relocating to St. Louis or Tempe makes no sense for their family.

The industry talks about scale, speed, and optionality.
Edward Jones talks about how great things will be once…

The competition is building for where clients are going.
Edward Jones is optimizing for where employees are sitting.

Imagine it’s 2030. Edward Jones introduces “Imagine it’s 2040”, a new campaign to reach market parity.

DC is at the helm and promises to outsource everything, generating record short term profits for GPs. “A penny saved is a penny earned”. Penny agrees.

Don't you all have your SIX SIGMA Black Belts!!!! Don't you all know how to code after 2020!!!! c'mon each initiative by Executive management have really delivered!!! You all can go into the ring with ANY color SIX SIGMA belt I am sure of it!!

SAP has money for share buybacks but no money for giving employees salary increments and benefits. SAP has money to increase executive board bonuses but no money for giving employees salary increments and benefits. SAP has money to invest in AI products that have no future but no money for giving employees salary increments and benefits.

In addition, Joule and other AI slop added to flagship products do not have a good adoption rate. Customers are not willing to pay a premium price for AI features that are unnecessary or downright bad and only increase costs. So they will look at alternatives for one or more products within the SAP ecosystem.

And every single discussion regarding these exact points is derailed by unsavory comments. I sincerely believe that SAP does not need any layoffs but they are doing so simply to instill fear and use this as a bargaining chip to pay less money to employees while the executive board maximize their bonuses. Every good comment here is followed by some bad ones that force the topic to be derailed.

And the only way to fix this is to highlight the real reasons why Dominic Asam, Christian Klein and others want layoffs.

We need to stop the infighting. Because the only people benefiting from this are the executive board and highly paid area heads and VPs and managers who don't add value but have very high salaries. And the losers are ALL SAP EMPLOYEES if we keep fighting between ourselves.

On that note, can someone please share more details about the reorganizations in 2026 Q1? And if there are any more details about any potential 2026 layoffs.

Get ready leadership ping pong 🏓 starts

Another financial advisor has lowered our sell price to below $30. Stank doing a great job! But, all the financial experts are wrong according to Stank.

All I’ve seen over the past year is top performers being shown the door, while the slickest office-politics players stay and continue damaging teams. Why is leadership so allergic to retaining actual talent?

A big personality will have convinced the powers-that-be that he can make a difference. He just needs to enact his special game plan.

The new year will start and the plan enacted. People will move, scores will be settled.

Then they’ll take their new recipe for the same cow patty, ball it up, and throw it against the wall. It won’t stick. It will run down the wall and slump to the floor as always.

They’ll adjust this strategy throughout the year. Same effect, with more score settling.

At the end of the year, the cycle will begin anew with a new big personality.

Watch and see.

Spot on. OP: @16v+1kdadhpwr

Reality: Will there be continued confusion, rearrangement of organizations with no benefit, outsourcing, gaslighting, propaganda, customers leaving, post it notes and RIF's? Yes. And now you are up to speed.

What you will hear: "We are set up for success in 2026 after making some tough decisions last quarter. We will continue to decrease cost and add customer value through the implementation of Artificial Intelligence. Our network continues to outperform our competitors and we continue to provide value to our shareholders through quarterly dividends. We are talking to the Union and working on that contract and feel good about it. No I cannot provide you any information on the new structure and how the work of those RIF'd will be handled. Here are some interns to tell you how great Verizon is. Last but not least, we would like to recognize employee X. This person worked hard and sold something last year. This does not mean they will keep their job, but does allow us to demonstrate how we are really great leaders by publicly recognizing someone."

If you find yourself clapping, using noise makers and waving a foam finger, please seek help.

We’ve been shedding truly skilled engineers like there’s no tomorrow. I’ve lost several exceptionally talented people on my team. It really boggles the mind.

What are your thoughts on the new Executive Director of IT Information Security, Corp Security Ops? Given the current leadership structure, it is worth questioning if this was a strategic move or just more corporate bloat.

A few points:
• Qualifications: Does his background actually align with the technical demands of the role, or is this another "style over substance" appointment?
• Redundancy: We already have an EVP/CISA and a VP Governance & Compliance in this department. Why was an Executive Director position necessary?
• Value Add: Is this role going to drive real security initiatives, or are we just funding another high-level salary to churn out monthly PowerPoint decks?

Does this seem like a genuine effort to strengthen our infrastructure, or is it just a waste of company resources?

If 2024 and 2025 proved anything, it’s that forcing people into offices five days a week didn’t fix culture, didn’t improve performance, and didn’t magically make the stock take off. What it did do was burn people out, drain morale, and push good talent out the door.

As we head into the new year, leadership has a choice. Keep doubling down on a policy everyone knows isn’t working, or finally admit that flexibility, trust, and results matter more than badge swipes and presence reports.

People want to do good work. They want balance. They want to feel respected. That’s not radical, that’s the modern workforce. Companies that get this are winning. Companies that don’t are watching their best people leave.

If 2026 is just another year of pretending RTO equals culture, nothing will change. If leadership actually listens and resets to a realistic hybrid model, there’s still a chance to rebuild trust.

New year. New opportunity. Same question.

Are we going to keep repeating the mistake, or finally learn from it?

It’s honestly wild watching some of the loudest RTO cheerleaders and management bootlickers act like loyalty is going to save them. These are the same folks who defend every decision no matter how destructive, as if leadership is going to knight them for “service.”

Here’s the reality they don’t want to hear:

The company doesn’t love you back.
Being the loudest “yes” person has never saved anyone from a layoff here. If anything, history shows the opposite: the people who blindly go along with everything are usually the first considered “nonessential” because they bring nothing unique to the table.

And let’s be honest… a lot of the hardcore bootlickers aren’t exactly the strongest performers. They survive by attaching themselves to leadership and hoping that being overly obedient somehow equals value.

Spoiler: It doesn’t.

While they’re out here glazing every leadership move like it’s divine strategy, the rest of us have actual skills and can see the writing on the wall.

Bootlicking isn’t job security.
Competence is.
Flexibility is.
Retaining real talent is.

And none of that is reflected in the current path this company is on.

So maybe instead of worshipping the people who would cut them in a heartbeat, they should start advocating for the changes that would actually help everyone… including themselves.

Years later and this abomination of a name is still struggling to gain traction. News flash, it never will. We’re never going to make progress with this name. It drags us down like an anchor and reflects poorly on both shareholders and teammates. In all these years, I haven’t met a single person outside the bank who doesn’t mock it. Even today, years later, the legacy names still have greater brand recognition and consumer trust - and they don't even exist anymore. Leadership needs to grow a pair and change back to one of the legacy names, even if it is to have a corporate structure like Meta/Facebook. I am a legacy teammate, and I don't care which one. Just pick one. They are both good names.

I am really going to miss those town halls with Charlie ‘Sharp as a Marble’. He was so inspirational when he took the canned questions from the Indians in the audience and answered them with utmost poise and professionalism. He and his big boys club will surely get a big bonus this year because of all the people they let down. Way to go Charlie, give yourself a pat on the back.

Has anyone had experience with having a meeting with the compliance investigation unit that can give me insight? We’ve had several on our team go through these meetings and end up fired due to our previous manager and it is making our region very nervous. A lot of it is due to changes in leadership and different preferences for documentation. The previous manager that has now left was…. special to say the least. Should those of us with these meetings be worried and start job searching?

With BS out, another org shake-up to cut spans and layers is unavoidable. A wave of senior exits is being politely labeled retirement, but it’s really a reset.

And while leadership churns, IDC’s forecast is inflating expectations.. numbers will spike whether execution is ready or not.

Less patience. Less cover. Bigger pressure.
The next phase won’t reward tenure.. it will expose performance.

Optimism has returned. Sanoke is a strong leader with conviction. It‘s like the last 10 years of leadership was just a bad dream.

Just like at Nutanix, all quiet from leadership. Boombox pumpin; up too loud!

MOC CFO replaced after just 2 years! Atleast it’s nice to see our competitors actually keeping their leadership accountable!

Politics rule this company. It would be established if they didn’t stop changing technology every 3 months… about the amount of time it takes for a senior leader to be let go or forced into retirement, and bringing in someone new who wants a notch on their belt for implementation.

Let’s also start where they positioned to sell to Cigna and took themselves out of regular insurance without signing contracts. Cigna backed out, most likely pointing and laughing and the stupidity. The email sent by sad-sack senior leadership was confusing, poorly written, and verified there was something fishy going on. If you’re going to lie, Humana, lie better.

Humana: when it takes a year or more to resolve IT issues but 3 months to restructure and change technologies.

As engineers supporting highly complex programs worry about potential 2026 layoffs at L3Harris, it’s worth remembering that has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on AlixPartners over four years on a failed attempt to roll out a simple reporting tool.
The money exists. It could have been invested directly into programs—staffing them properly and supporting frontline teams with real expertise. Instead, it was wasted.
Executive leadership should never allow this level of misallocation while employees are asked to do more with less. Defense work is hard enough; it becomes impossible without company support.
It’s time to invest in the people actually delivering the mission.

Your company lacks corporate transparency. Modern forward looking companies practice social responsibility with ESG transparency. In 2026, Rich'
Board needs to get into the 21st century with basic corporate norms. Transparency boots employee morale, confidence, and helps the company address and allocate resources better:

++Full Annual Report w/full audit financials & audit report++
++Corporate Executive Compensation Policy & Disclosures Published w/compensation for all SVPs and above by name & amount++
++Publish Board of Directors Compensation along with outside business interests++
++Summary of Board Minutes & Agendas++
++Board of Directors required to provide update to employees and to meet w/employees & clients through focus groups each quarter++
++Publish Annual Filing w/NYDFS w/all schedules on public website++
++Publish 5 year strategic plan to all employees++
++Post Corporate Tax Return on public website++
++Post all pages of the full un redacted rating agencies reports on the public website++
++require all internal leaders of divisions to hold quarterly meetings with all of their divisions and employees especially in IT, Sales, & Operations++
++Human Resources needs to release all results of Annual Employee Culture Survey within 1 month of survey completion++ no sitting on the survey results.
++360 feedback by associates of their managers and their managers managers++

Remember, the cover up is worse than the crime and it's time to stop covering up. This is not Watergate.

Phillips 66 is in serious trouble, and it’s no longer honest to pretend otherwise. Over the past four years, not a single major initiative has produced a durable, repeatable positive outcome. Some have shown short-term gains on paper, but none have proven sustainable.

The acquisition of DCP Midstream itself was not inherently the problem. The mistake was allowing leadership and operating philosophies from a joint-venture culture where compromises, exceptions, and optics were often tolerated to take control of a legacy enterprise built on accountability, discipline, and execution.

The result has been a leadership model that prioritizes messaging over outcomes and reaction over strategy. Propaganda and internal campaigns may shape narratives, but markets, performance, and attrition do not lie. A company with world-class people and assets is being managed like a short-term experiment rather than a long-term enterprise.

What makes this especially concerning is the pattern: frequent pivots, walk-backs, and directional changes that signal a lack of conviction and operational understanding. This is not innovation, it is instability. Accountability is routinely deferred, while experienced people and institutional knowledge leave at a startling pace.

At some point, shareholders and long-tenured employees alike have to confront reality. Talent loss, cultural erosion, and repeated course corrections are not coincidences; they are symptoms. Cynicism is not the problem here, it is a rational response to sustained underperformance.

Phillips 66 does not have a people problem or an asset problem. It has a leadership problem. Until that is acknowledged, the unraveling will continue, regardless of how polished the messaging becomes.

“When the story feels good enough, evidence becomes optional.”