#pip

3 years ago I decided to quiet quit and then skate along
I thought that it was only a matter of time before I get fired for taking advantage of the system to the max.
I started preparing for the job hunting phase again as I fully expected to get sacked in the matter of months...

Here I am today, still doing sweet FA with an IPF of 1.2
And by doing sweet FA, I mean promoting absolute slop and waiting for chatgpt to finish doing its thing for 20-25 hour weeks MAX

How is this possible?

How have I not been fired, put on a PIP or even warned verbally?

Classification Shift: "Performance" vs. "Reduction in Force"
When a company executes a formal Reduction in Force (RIF), standard severance protocols (often 1 to 9 months of base pay based on tenure, plus healthcare continuation) apply. However, recent legal challenges and employee reports highlight a shift toward using performance-based separations: 
Forced Calibration & PIP Opt-Outs: Under calibrated performance systems, a predetermined percentage of employees are placed into lower performance tiers. Workers are often offered a choice: enter a strict Performance Enhancement Plan (PEP) or voluntarily opt for a modest, immediate severance package. If an employee enters the PEP and fails, they are terminated for cause—yielding $0 in severance. 
Sidestepping Pension Milestones: Federal litigation filed against the company alleges that forcing older or long-tenured employees into low performance tiers allows the organization to terminate workers shortly before reaching major pension or benefit vesting milestones, eliminating both severance and long-term benefit liabilities.

I never planned to retire early but after seeing how others are treated I am going out on a high note rather than waiting to be put in a PIP and forced out. Goodbye everyone!

PS: rising interest rates also helped me decide to leave.

Let me chime in on PIPs with some pearls of wisdom, for whtever they're worth.

If you get put on a PIP, first thing I would do is get very clear on what they actually want from you, and I mean VERY clear. Dont accept the usual vague stuff like "needs to demonstrate leadership" or "needs to communicate more effectively." Ask what specifically you're supposed to do differently, how they're measuring it, and what passing the PIP actually looks like. Then write stuff down and I don't mean start acting like youre building a court case and copying half of EM on every email, that's probably going to make things worse. Just keep a record. If you meet with your boss and he tells you that you need to do X by Friday, send him a normal email afterward saying thanks for meeting, just wanted to make sure I understood, I'll have X done by Friday and we'll review Y next week.... Because 2 mo later memories have a funny way of changing. Same thing if they say you didn't do something and you know you did. Don't get into a big fight about it, just correct it. "I think there may be some confusion here, I sent that on the 12 th, see attached." Keep it factual and keep your emotions out of email, which is probably harder than it sounds when you're pi---d off and worried about losing your job. Also pay attention if the requirements start changing. If they told you one thing at the beginning and suddenly you're being judged on something else halfway through, ask about it. Again, don't send some crazy email accusing everyone of moving the goalposts. Just ask, "I thought the expectation we agreed on was X. Has that changed?" Now it's documented and u good... I also wouldn't run to HR expecting them to straighten everything out because your mgr is being unfair. HR works for the company, protect EM is the mission... Sometimes they can help especially if something doesn't smell right, but they're not your personal advocate. Just understand that going in.

Here's another thing people don't like hearing... Maybe the PIP is bullsh-t (I kinda think it is)... But maybe it isn't. Find somebody you trust who knows your work and ask them, and don't pick the person who's automatically going to tell you your boss is an a--hole. Find somebody who will tell you if YOU are the problem. That's useful information too. If you honestly think there's discrimination, retaliation, protected leave or something legal involved, then I'd talk to an employment attorney. That's way beyond anything you're going to figure out from this board. And personally, the day I got a PIP would also be the day I started looking for another job. Not because you're definitely getting fired. People do survive PIPs. But at that point EM has formally told you there's a problem with your performance and you'd be nuts not to prepare for the possibility that this doesn't end well.

So I'd work my a-s off trying to pass it while at the same time quietly working on getting out. And don't quit just because you're angry. Don't send the email you really want to send. Don't tell your boss what everybody thinks of him. Don't make some grand stand on principle. Be boring. Do the work, ask questions, keep notes, save the emails. If they say you sc--wed something up and you didn't, correct the record. If they change what they want, ask why. Meanwhile get the resume out there. Best case, you pass the PIP and now you have choices. Worst case, at least you didn't spend PIP period assuming everything would somehow work itself out.

Just remember if the company relocated you then you have to wait a whole year before you can quit and not have to repay the company for relocation expenses. Another reason to not be mobile. They don’t reward mobility anyway. If your partner works there is no chance you will make up for the lost income of your partner quitting their job. Project teams and UNCON teams in Midland all get PIPd as well. Better to be in Houston than to be PIPd somewhere else where finding a new job will be hard.

There seems to be a pattern emerging at Microsoft where some employees are going into their annual rewards discussions and finding out they are being terminated. Several employees have reported that people receiving zero or very low rewards are being exited, sometimes immediately. What is strange is that the treatment does not appear consistent. Some people say they were offered a PIP or a voluntary separation package, while others say they were terminated with no PIP option and little or no severance.

The reports do not appear to be limited to one team. People have mentioned engineering, CSS and parts of the Xbox organization.

It is difficult to tell how large this is because these appear to be smaller or individual terminations rather than one announced layoff event. That may also explain why there has been relatively little public reporting.

Has anyone else at Microsoft seen this happening during the current rewards cycle? Are these isolated performance exits, or is Microsoft using the rewards process for a broader headcount reduction?

Manager shared with us last week. Bottom 5-10% will be put on PIP. There won't be anymore mega corporate re-orgs every few years, it's going to be slow culling.

Is that the latest cost-cutting strategy?

Show us the graphs and projections for headcount by country and location. How many of us are you planning to stealth layoff via the PIP?

What are his chances of actually making it without getting fired at the end?

I’ve heard the new my performance thing is a way to speed run the PIP because they can use AI to summarize your history and check if it can justify a PIP.

Want to get out of here via LR not PIP preferably. Anyone know if there’s gonna be one in November?

Please only respond if you’re a super official person that heard it from G2 himself

I was put on a PIP last week. My mid-year review was pretty normal & overall positive. Then my manager suddenly hit me with the PIP last week.
It honestly feels like a numbers game at this point.
A lot of what's written in the PIP assessment is either flat-out untrue or very debatable. Has anyone here had experience pushing back on or challenging a PIP? Is it worth addressing the points I disagree with, or could that just make me look difficult & potentially speed up an RA?
EMEA / marketing

Seldom layoffs don't mean sh-t. A coworker can be there one day and gone the next, sometimes with almost no warning. They find a reason and they find a way. If you think you're safe just because there are no layoffs coming and you haven't been PIPed, you're a fool.

I spoke with a senior director who I’m also friends with. He advised me to make sure all Activity Sync entries are accurate because they’re planning to have an AI agent review the data next year to identify potentially fraudulent or fabricated entries. They’re already aware that some people are logging meetings that never actually happened, while the expected results aren’t showing up.

They have something similar being used for ISRs already, although it apparently isn’t working correctly yet (which is hardly surprising). Once they get it working properly, they’ll start identifying teams that need improvement. The ISM or RSD will then be responsible for addressing individuals who are abusing or manipulating the metrics.

Personally, I think all of this is part of a broader effort to enforce PIPs across the organization. My concern is that the company would rather push people out through performance management than provide severance.

All supermajors are shrinking workforces either by layoff (e.g., Shell, SABIC), demotion (Chevron’s firing and rehiring at lower CL). We are too cheap to pay severance, our mantra has been to offshore jobs and PIP fire US workforce and hire aggressively to manage average pay per employee down in US. If you are unsatisfied with your ranking, it has nothing to do with your performance, it is all about how your political manager played the musical chair during ranking meetings and sacrificed you for someone else. Leave the toxic job before as soon as you get an opportunity. You will never reach 55 or a retiree status here by being a good worker (impossible to be a good manager in current EM).

The Streisand Effect Thrives at ExxonMobil

Attempts to suppress information are often made through cease-and-desist letters, but instead of being suppressed, the information sometimes receives extensive publicity, becoming viral over the Internet or being distributed on file-sharing networks.

Seeking or obtaining an injunction to prohibit something from being published or to remove something that is already published can "backfire" by increasing the publicity of the published work.

The Streisand effect has been described as an example of psychological reactance, wherein once people are aware that some information is being kept from them, they are significantly more motivated to acquire and spread it.

The Streisand effect has been observed in relation to the right to be forgotten, the right in some jurisdictions to have private information about a person removed from internet searches and other directories under some circumstances. A litigant attempting to remove information from search engines risks the litigation itself being reported in the news.

The phenomenon has been described by the Chinese proverb "(when one) attempts to cover (the truth), (it) becomes more conspicuous" (欲蓋彌彰, pinyin: Yù gài mí zhāng).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect

I saw and heard some rumors of PIPs being given in RR and Nashville, any truth to these at all?

Source: J. Bateh, PhD

That improvement plan isn't a rescue. The decision's already made. Formal write-ups are up nearly 30 percent since 2020. Most people on one don't make it out the other side.

Seven signs the PIP was never about improvement:

1/ The goals arrived without warning
→ No prior conversation about the gap
→ No coaching before the paperwork
→ Straight from fine to formal, overnight

2/ The timeline is too short to be real
→ Thirty days to reverse months of feedback
→ Not enough runway to actually improve
→ Just enough to build a paper trail

3/ Support gets promised, not delivered
→ Training mentioned, never scheduled
→ Check-ins that quietly stop happening
→ Words on a document, nothing behind them

4/ HR is looped in before you are
→ The plan already has a shape
→ Legal language appears immediately
→ You're the last to know it's happening

5/ The goals shift once you meet them
→ Hit one target, another appears
→ The bar moves faster than you can climb it
→ Success was never actually the point

6/ Your manager avoids specifics
→ Vague feedback dressed up as formal process
→ Nothing concrete enough to actually fix
→ Hard to improve at something undefined

7/ You're quietly encouraged to resign
→ Framed as preserving your dignity
→ It also preserves their severance budget
→ Read that offer carefully before taking it

A real improvement plan wants you to stay. A paper trail just wants a clean exit.

Just confirmed on C15 level in a meeting, so unless you guys want to be on a PIP better adhere to it because your manager will land in hot water for it, and there is nothing managers hate more than taking responsibility for their employees.

Anyone have this issue?

I am not getting a push notification for 2-Step authentication through IBM verify app... prompts w3 which I cannot log into because it was deactivated - need to do all of this so i can be "officially" fired..... seems there is no good IT support for "Alums"

It's here again. Within weeks the stack rankings for year end 2026 begins. Never sign a PIP let them fire you. But the wicked things is the firings will only lead to a computer outage and/or an OCC MRA or Consent Order because there's no left to keep the Capone from crashing. Wishing all the worst things for Capone management.

Is there any reliable statistic on how many employees choose PIL versus a PIP, how many eligible employees actually retire, what percentage of PIPs HR allows to pass, and how many employees leave the company even after "passing" a PIP?

For employees who management let them pass their PIPs, did management indicate early on that they would support them? Were there any signals you could identify?

So many spend like the job will last forever. I think that more frequent layoffs, PIP, offshoring of jobs to India, etc, have made it clear that's not the case. I know a few folks who are now panicking because their savings are nowhere close to where they need to be in case they lose their jobs. Don't let this happen to you. Start saving and investing. It is liberating to have a pile of fu-k you money. I’ve know people who had their pile of duck you money and when they were given unfair ranking feedback literally said fu-k you and walked out of the office.

I left on my terms and conditions. I milked the company all the way until the end of my employment. Anyone can do the same before you get placed on a PIP or RIF’d. This company is so Mickey Mouse. They love to engage in psychological warfare as most Fortune 500 corporations use the same tactics, but I became the victor!

Has anyone else heard of people being put on PIPS? Quite a few people in my team are suddenly HR targets.

Looks and sounds like an undercover way of reducing headcount.

100% Stock Appreciation Required to catchup with KO
Who's having that review?

PIPed this month after receiving salary increase for the first half. Been with IBM 8 years. Should I expect to be let go? Can they let me go before the PIP ends? There were multiple put on PIPs in my group. We are all expecting to be let go in December if the rumors are correct.

It seems like if you are an HBA, a lot of managers are pushing for needs improvement to try to push out HBA’s. Mine came as a surprise, with a PIP, doesn’t seems like they want improvement but a resignation/termination. This place has changed so much…

Just like last September and March. September is always a little subdued. This September 14/15th saw around 5,000 total let go. March 2027 is going to be another big round like last year. Expect people to be put on PIPs before the layoff. Expect more AI tools being pushed onto the development process.

Welcome PIPs!

Again, PIP season is coming. 5 of my team mates on PIPs yesterday.

That's insane...

Are only PIPs used to reduce workforce?

They aren’t even trying to hide their plans anymore. It is common knowledge that once you hit late 40’s you are toast. Good luck becoming a retiree.

There are so many woman taking LOA as of September 30. What a luxury to take a year off amid massive restructuring! Right now in the Finance everybody knows there are huge cuts coming. Everybody knows after Polaris is implemented there is no need for that staff. And everybody knows if you are late 40s early 50s your risk to get PIPd is high. And I’ve heard from several people now in the after Polaris they will begin offering packages to those close to retirement.

If you can afford a year or two without salary because you saved or have an executive husband, you save being PIPd, still get years of vesting, health insurance, and leave with a package.

How often are they given out? Throughout the year or is there a specific period when they put people on them and the rest of the year is safe?

More evidence of how corrupt the system is. Supervisors begging those out in NSI to take the PIP because they are needed and the company doesn’t want them to quit. Supervisors promising before PIP even starts that it will be passed. Clear evidence there were no issues to begin with and that the low ranking was just evidence of how broken the assessment system is.