Will this directly equate to a 4% reduction in employee headcount? On McElcunt’s town hall he referenced more targeted cuts as opposed to evenly “spread” staff reductions. I’m concerned this means more experienced high paying positions being cut or eliminated in 2020. I believe Randy already referenced headcount at 252,000 in 3rd quarter down from 268,000 to start 2020. I assume that number will go down another 5-10k by end of year with active surpluses and the MVO. At this rate we could be below 200k employees by 2020/2021. Beyond all the uncertainty those left behind will have an ever increasing work load.
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If you make it to Dallas you can see the expensive Christmas party the executives throw for themselves in Whitaker Tower that is closed to the everyday working folks!!
Those making over $250k will not be laid off. The company freebies are too important to give up!
Haven’t you heard? In the new economies the middle & lower class take brunt of poor leaderships decisions when they fail. The elite also takes credit and the majority of profits when things work well so, the 99% is soaked either way. No more accountability
Poor decisions allow the elite to either pull the golden ripcord or move on to another company or board. We need to move a more fairer system that has stakeholders and not shareholders, where all parties are part of shared profits/decisions.
Capitalism is still the answer it just needs to be tweaked because the system is too slanted towards the elite class. Socialism isn’t the answer never has been. Millions have died proving that.
ID: @12mB4FYp-1grv Makes a excellent point. Labor costs could mean a variety of things and implemented in a variety of ways. The big shots are not going to back themselves into a corner on this announcement. However someone will take the last published employee count, multiply it by 4% and say they lied to us if it doesn’t meet that number. And what number will be used as baseline? First of year? Number after raises, etc are figured in? Numbers have already been run taking into account cost increases. Say everyone averages a 2% raise spread out over 250,000 people. Decent dollar figure that has to be accounted for.
"The bottom line is the company sees you as a cost and not an asset". If I am a cost what does that make Randall & Stankey? We have given our life blood to this place and they flush billions down the toilet.
RE: "They won’t fire the person that gases up the c-suite executives cars with free fuel on the company pcard!! Imagine parking your car on empty and like magic you have a full tank everyday with no money out of your pocket!!!"
Don't forget about the corporate jets you never see.
A 4% cut in labor cost doesn't translate directly to headcount. They way it works is Finance tells operating units to cut $x dollars from their budget. The operating units look at employees, contractors, and overall spending. From there they make decisions. They also tell compensation to look at ways to save costs. This could mean less in raises, changes in bonus calculations, and shifting more of the cost burden onto the employees for benefits like healthcare and other benefits. The bottom line is the company sees you as a cost and not an asset. Plan accordingly.
@ -1wyz, you have said what and how I think and feel. It really is quite unbelievable, looking at the track record of Randy and the John's, what utter eff-ups they have been, and they are still here. And yet, they truly act is if they are running at a level above real tech companies giants like Amazon, MS, Google, Apple, etc. And now look the sad state of affairs we find ourselves in, we parting out our company like a junk car for sc-ap to AWS and Azure, and replace employees with big name consultants to run it all. Randy and the Johns have reduced us to the laughing stock of the industry. I fear that one day soon, we will be the text book analysis of how not to run a business.
The company cares diddly squat about technical skills, higher education or experience......it is evident in every move they make...
I can only hope that Randall and stankey are let go too. Stock price s—s and this is on them
4% labor cost reduction do not associate with 4% headcount reduction. There will surely be a change to what they pay into pension, 401k, and charge for healthcare which by far is the biggest employee expense and they will find some way to screw us retirees for some of that. Finance does have quarterly headcount numbers to be met, and budget for that. I’m sure the Johns and Randy have put everything for 2020 in black and white and have a plan to execute on.
I’m just going to be honest here, two things motivate me in my career. Money and job security. If leadership wants to take that away you can guess how motivated I’m going to be. If they want to play games I’ll spend my day actively looking for a new career while taking their money then go work for the competition. I don’t owe AT&T a f—ing thing at this point. Randy and Stanky can kiss the darkest part of my lily white a–. Maybe if we got rid of one executive they’d have their labor savings. These id–ts lost billions on T-Mobile then bought DirecTV and TW right when the market was shifting away from big pay TV and traditional movies. We still haven’t rolled out a viable streaming service and slowed our fiber build to a crawl. How the hell do they still have a job? Randy & John have failed at every turn, the numbers don’t lie. Record debt while purging millions of customers and our wireless coverage is a distant second place to Verizon. Other than the tech bubble years our stock price has done nothing but somehow these executives walk around acting like they run Amazon, Google, Apple or Facebook. The leaders of those corporations probably set around laughing at you clowns.
This is starting to feel like 2009 during great recession when they only paid out like 40% of the bonus and managers didn’t get a pay increase. Then after the surpluses and MVO we were left working longer hours for less money but hey, “at least you still have a job”
Don’t forget the cost of benefits. They’ll be looking to cut that as well along with contract labor. Pension, 401k match, health care benefits, managers, union and contractors salaries all fall under the realm of labor cost. Even the severance when they offer MVO or surplus is included in labor cost. Wouldn’t be surprised if they reduce that from six months to 30 days pay soon.
There is a reason they are selling all these buildings and consolidating work locations.
Cut labor cost, cut expense, cut cap spending.....cut...cut....cut
They won’t fire the person that gases up the c-suite executives cars with free fuel on the company pcard!! Imagine parking your car on empty and like magic you have a full tank everyday with no money out of your pocket!!!
The closer you get to the 75 rule the bigger the target no matter what you do.
So basically some of the most qualified and experienced managers and union employees at the company
A lot of the more “technical” positions requiring higher education and experience might be in that group as well
Group 1 craft? L2 managers or anyone who’s been here longer than 30 years? Safe to assume those are all higher paying jobs
Group 1 craft positions on the bargained for side and anything at or above a level 2 on the management/non-bargained side would probably be safe to consider “higher” paying positions at AT&T. On the management side employees with more than 30 years service are most likely on the higher side by default.
What do you guys consider “higher paying positions” besides c-suite executives obviously
Well that s—s
I’m pretty sure the union wage increase in 2020 is around 2.5% average so you can add that to the 4% they need to cut. I think the labor cost reduction will impact management and bargained employees. The higher paying positions might have a target on their back next year.
Keep in mind the union contracts have built in wage increases so management cuts could be deeper than 4% to compensate. Also possible 2020... no manager pay increase or bonus. Basically bad any way you look at it.