#turnover

It looks like more people will be let go in December. High-cost countries will be affected, but also Serbia and India. Serbia is usually left out (minimum impact) of the RIFs, as there is a huge turnover there, and Service Desks are decimated. Serbia is raising its minimum wage by January so entry-level jobs will be in the same range.

Will audit ever slow down the revolving door of people leaving? Every time you turn around you are explaining a finding to a new auditor that is so clueless you wonder how TAS operates and gets anything done.

Something must seriously be brewing in the pot.

I have just downloaded their sustainability report. Page 27 has some interesting figures on human capital especially those on staff and staff location and turnover. Also, the way they talk about the Voice Survey from last year like a big success without reporting the actual figures is shocking

As CCA (Complex Clinical Audit) is very young in its programs so let’s change up leadership by moving around Directors that have never worked in other line of business…this makes zero sense. JS the Staff VP this is her grand idea. Let’s cause more division and turnover. It’s going to take 6 months to year to train these Directors in their new positions and who’s going to have to do it…the teams the managers and staff who are currently drowning!! Don’t ever work in CCA. It’s horrible everyday and the blame rests on the managers to fix the survey results!

We have become a case study for students!

ExxonMobil is one of the largest publicly traded international oil and gas companies in the world. So why is this successful 140-year-old company dealing with an allegedly toxic organizational culture?

What is organizational culture?
Organizational culture is a firm’s shared values, beliefs, traditions, principles, rules, and role models for behavior. Also called corporate culture, an organizational culture exists in every organization, regardless of size, organizational type, product, or profit objective.

COVID-19 exposes cultural problems
According to a Bloomberg article, the pandemic was a difficult time for Exxon employees thanks, in part, to low crude oil prices. Salary increases were halted, benefits were reduced, and the company faced layoffs.

Morale was low, so after about a year and a half, Bill Keillor, global IT vice president, wanted to help. His leadership teamed arranged an awards ceremony and promoted it on the company’s internal social network Yammer. According to anonymous reports, the award ceremony, which was largely virtual, turned into a tense town hall with attendees voicing concerns and asking tough questions. Exxon is known for having an authoritarian, top-down culture, so this did not sit well. Allegedly, Keillor snapped at attendees and brushed off their questions.

Turnover
After the event, employee-created memes circulated private chats, slowly making their way across the company. Some joked about quitting, but for others, it wasn’t a joke. The company’s turnover rate is the highest since 1999 when Exxon merged with Mobil. In the last two years, 12,000 employees have departed, less than half of which were from layoffs.

According to an Exxon statement, every company has experienced attrition in recent years due to the Great Resignation, and the oil and gas company does not consider this to be a long-term trend. Revelio Labs, an intelligence company that uses public employment records, says Exxon’s turnover rate is in line with the nationwide average but higher than competitors, including BP, Chevron, and Shell. Exxon disagrees with this analysis.

Inside Exxon’s culture
Bloomberg Businessweek’s investigation suggests there may be a deeper problem at Exxon. The publication interviewed more than 40 employees (current and former) and reviewed dozens of Exxon’s internal documents, and found evidence that Exxon has an insular, fear-based culture that is out of touch with the outside world.

Exxon uses a performance ranking system. Previously, employees were ordered from 1-to-100 on a bell curve, but the system was reworked in 2020 to make the processes more transparent and helpful to employees. Instead, employees are placed in performance categories. Anyone in the lowest category can choose between a performance improvement plan or severances. According to Reuters, about 5 to 10 percent of the company’s workforce is assigned performance improvement plans. Employees in the lowest-performing tier can save their job by improving their performance, but a significant portion of them will leave.

A senior corporate advisor says the system should not be feared or a source of anxiety because it helps employees succeed and keeps their performance in line with organizational objectives. On the other hand, some individuals say the ranking system makes employees hesitant to share bad news or unpopular opinions.

According to an analysis by CultureX, an MIT organization that uses artificial intelligence to evaluate organizational culture using Glassdoor reviews, Exxon faces toxicity challenges and ranks below 143 out of the 196 industry benchmarks CultureX measures. The most frequently discussed cultural values, according to more than 1,400 Glassdoor reviews, are agility, performance, and execution.

Exxon on the defense
An Exxon spokesperson responded to these criticisms, saying they were unfounded. The spokesperson pointed to the number of new employees hired every year and how long people tend to stay with the organization. She suggested Bloomberg’s investigation made broad observations with few data points.

Despite these questions about ExxonMobil’s organizational culture, the company is performing well financially with its stock nearing a record high. If there is indeed an organizational culture problem, Exxon will have to address it to attract and retain the best talent.

In the Classroom
This article can be used to discuss organizational culture (Chapter 7: Organization, Teamwork, and Communication), morale (Chapter 9: Motivating the Workforce), and turnover (Chapter 10: Managing Human Resources).

Discussion Questions

Define organizational culture, morale, and turnover.

What evidence is there to suggest ExxonMobil has a negative organizational culture?

If ExxonMobil has a top-down, authoritarian culture, why do you think employees spoke up during the award ceremony about their concerns? Why do you think more than 40 employees agreed to speak with Bloomberg?

This article was developed with the support of Kelsey Reddick for and under the direction of O.C. Ferrell, Linda Ferrell, and Geoff Hirt.

References:
"ExxonMobil," Sloan Review, https://sloanreview.mit.edu/culture500/company/c289/ExxonMobil

Jennifer Hiller and Shariq Khan, "Angst at Exxon as Managers Begin Employee Performance Reviews," Reuters, June 21, 2021, https://www.reuters.com/business/exxon-cut-us-workforce-by-up-10-annually-bloomberg-news-2021-06-21/

Kevin Crowley, "Exxon’s Exodus: Employees Have Finally Had Enough of Its Toxic Culture," Bloomberg, October 13, 2022, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-10-13/exxon-xom-jobs-exodus-brings-scrutiny-to-corporate-culture

https://www.mheducation.com/highered/blog/2024/06/does-exxon-have-a-culture-problem-march-2023.html

Not suprised oracle is laying ppl off. They’ve done 150+ acquisitions and the same thing happens every damn time... staff bail or get cut. This Has Happened MANY Times Before!!!!! oracle doesnt care about your job, they care about tech, customers, and $$$. once they buy a company, they gut the overlap, toss people they dont need, and shove the rest into whatever buzzword strategy they’re chasing (cloud, ai, whatever sounds cool to wall street). turnover there is already huge, so add an acquisition and yeah... ppl are basically walking severance packages waiting to happen. remember sun microsystems, peoplesoft, bea? same playbook. oracle buys, oracle cuts, oracle moves on. so if you’re shocked, idk what to tell you. layoffs are not a bug in oracle world, they’re the feature. ....

Because that’s all that’ll be left in a few months once the job market turns. I heard 50+ in marketing solutions are planning to bounce by EOY. They don’t trust leadership at all because of Martin and Spiegel

Sampath strikes again with his favorite sport: talking down to the workforce while pretending he’s discovered management philosophy. Translation of his post: “We cut middle managers, slowed promotions, shrank the talent pool, and guaranteed attrition… but hey, decisions move faster!”

This isn’t leadership, it’s narcissism with a LinkedIn filter. Only a CEO at Verizon could brag about hollowing out the company while admitting it leaves employees with fewer career paths, worse pay equity, and higher churn. Then he pats himself on the back for “fewer layers.”

It’s not strategy, it’s shrinkage dressed up as innovation. The BSG boy is just narrating his own PowerPoint slides.

Apache needs leadership starting from the top in midland and houston or nothing will change... the culture is broken and turnover never stops. People want flexibility better pay and benefits and leaders who actually follow through

You need to DO BETTER & practice what you preach.

Stop lying, it's better to keep quiet than to lie.

right now Apache & mgmt cares more about wall street than the people working in the field... good decision making and clear communication would go a long way but it feels missing. consolidation might help but without change at the svp level and above it will stay the same cycle.

Why are so many leaving. Are these silent LRs

We’re literally down to bare bones now, without anyone who truly knows all the ropes. Over the past two years, skilled veterans have been disproportionately targeted. I don’t even think it’s about age. More likely, it’s because good work and accumulated experience come with a price. Tomorrow, leadership will have no right to complain when there’s no quality work coming out of their organization. You get what you pay for. What short-sighted a--hats.

This can't be normal, right? This is my first real corporate job, so I don't have much experience to go off. However, I've only been in this role for five, roughly 6 months. There have been multiple layoffs since I joined the company, is it always like this? I have had three different managers in the span of pretty much six months... what is going on?

Shweta Bhatia 7 month tenure as CTO.... what did she do?

Another team lift out in Denver. Nothing to see here folks. Also, a PM left the twin cities.

Senior leadership is doing a bang up
Job.

I commend all the ones finally leaving Walgreens, there are a lot more than I thought would leave without being forced out. You have my full respect. You will be so much better off regardless of what you decide to do in life. For the ones that drink the kool aid nonstop and will never leave unless forced to, you get what you deserve. It's the best you can get is Walgreen's. Says enough.

Why does Cash Vault have such high turnover? They are contract workers, so they don't get displaced, but it seems like they come and go so quickly.