I don't know exactly when things changed, but IBM feels nothing like it used to. People are exhausted, nobody has much enthusiasm anymore, nobody seems interested in anything, and the old sense that everyone was in it together is gone. We used to actually enjoy seeing each other and working together. Now everyone's just trying to get through the day. I miss the old IBM.
22 replies (most recent on top)
@vb Sad but true. And Congress, like IBM managers, the enablers, are spineless pu----s.
@j5 100% same thought and question! If 52% of your employees are in India - how the he-l are you getting sensitive US government contracts?
@j0 I think, IBM is cheating to gain Federal government contract. Some of the most critical IBM products components have been moved to India. This should have raised some red flags regarding security.
@ee There are very few (if any) NATIVE ENGLISH-SPEAKING people in India. And for marketing and communications, that makes a difference. (The official base publication of all IBM marketing and comms materials is US English.) Although IBM management could care less how IBM comes off to the rest of the world ... with bad grammer, poor understanding of the nuances of English that one can only acquire living in the US for years.
@ee If IBM, a US based company, is making 50% of it revenue in the US market, it should be mandated to have at least 50% of its workforce US employees. That should apply to all US based companies. That is just common sense.
To have the bulk of employees in India, while the US market is the major outlet of IBM products and services, it is scam disguised as "globalization" or some other bullsh-t.
Otherwise, It should move it business headquarters to India and be considered a foreign company in the US.
@ee your numbers are way off. IBM had had so many acquisitions. It eliminates, adds more, eliminates more, and so on. IBM has laid off at least 22k since 2022 when Arvind began this death match to an inflated stock price. All of those acquisitions involve people, too, who are told to bleed blue before knifed themselves.
IBM is not a tech company; it is a private equity company that raids the assets of its acquisitions and liquidates what it can.
Your "burden" language is truly nauseating. Labor arbitraging does not come down to a choice. Indians do not choose to accept a much lower salary. They choose to accept a much higher salary that would give them a vastly better quality of life than what they could obtain otherwise. And in a higher cost-of-living country such as America, that same $ choice would be for a much lower quality of living than those around them. A salary that would give you a huge home and servants in India wouldn't get you a two bedroom apartment in the United States in any major city. That's not really a choice is it?
I don't really blame Indians for choosing a better way of life for themselves. I do blame people like you and IBM who choose to exploit financial elements that are not under any of our control. And they do it without consideration for quality, expertise, talent, or experience. Completely vile.
@ee It seems that the 6 Indians to 1 American ratio did hit a nerve. So, you came up with all the bullsh-t.
@ee let's just move the whole shithole to india then. A--hole.
@E1. Just stop with this 6 to 1 nonsense. Do you honestly believe there are no smart people in India? IBM replaces (just like Microsoft, Oracle, etc etc) one for one as the entire goal is to lower costs. It’s a fact that employees (like for like USA to India) cost approx 1/3 the USA burden rate. That means for every USA employee dropped and replaced via an India employee, IBM nets 66% of the usa’s employees burden rate to the bottom line reflected in cost savings. This is essential when your growth rate is stalled.
Still don’t believe me? Let’s use your 6 to 1 ratio and run the equation backwards.
Currently IBM India has 135k worth of employees. 135,000/6 =22,500. So who on this website for layoffs really believes IBM worldwide over the last 15 years has only laid off 22k worth of employees and replaced them all in India. Thats correct the sound you are hearing is crickets. Now let’s run the equation again using a 1 for 1 rate (eg smart capable employees) That says IBM laid off 135k worth of employees worldwide to grow India to its current 135k, while pocketing 135k USA burden rate times 66%. That’s approx a 9 billion dollar savings using your 100k USA burden rate, but more realistically 13.5 billion in savings using the 3-1 cost rate (50k burden rate India all in vs 150k USA burdens rate all in). The CFO has told you hundreds of times it’s all about cost shifting and nothing more. Yes India has piles of smart folks, and due to that excess they are willing to work for 33% of USA burden rates. The laws of supply and demand don’t stop at a countries border. You just don’t want to face the facts that IBM will continue to push this offshoring until customers say “enough”. My guess is that happens at approx 30-35k USA headcount.
Are you Rip Van Winkle ? Have you been asleep in the Catskill Mountains for the past 30 years ? Did you just wake up ? .....welcome to 2026
@dp Notice, you need 6 in India at $50K each to do the job of one in US at $100K.
It's great if you live in India and want to make $50k a year. Otherwise, it su-ks. Glad to be gone.
@am+1m2ba37ve
Huiming has run the site for 15 years. He is fair weather when its comes to values. He Only upholds and adheres when suits him. He is not a decent man.
It's because IBM's only product nowadays is quarterly earnings, not software, hardware, or services. IBM is in the business of financial engineering, not technology. The raw materials are RAs and PIPs and convoluted deals that exist to manufacture revenue on paper but that create no value for IBM or its customers. Everyone knows it's not sustainable and that Arvind is just trying to keep it all from collapsing until he rides off with his bag in the near future.
Oh hooey! I was at the ibm shithole in the 20teens and it su-ked more than linda lovelace. Get the fu-k out of that shithole!
"and the old sense that everyone was in it together is gone. "
If you ever deal with a letter band level person (and you are NOT one) it is beyond blindingly obvious that not everyone is in it together. It's a small club @OP, and you ain't in it.
@b3 I bled blue for nearly 30 years. Now, my heart is broken. I cry for what once was and should have been.
Nothing lasts forever. I bled deepest blue for my first 29 years. Many around me cared for the place too.
The last several years, I would have left, but have been trapped at IBM by external circumstances. I now honor my contractual commitment to them, but volunteer nothing further. Some colleagues do still care for their immediate local team, but none care for the juggernaut IBM. None.
I’ll be cheering when the current senior leadership or their handpicked successors steer IBM onto the shoals of bankruptcy dissolution.
I was one of the few IBMers chosen to attend IBM’s 100th birthday celebration with representatives of the Watson family. Things were already sliding then, but there was collective hope among that hard core audience for a renewed future. That hope was grounded in what IBM once was and the principles that it had stood for. Subsequent IBM leadership has removed all vestiges of that foundation. Details and strategies must evolve, but principles and beliefs define who you are. Change them, and you become a different beast altogether.
@OP IBM has been walking a fine line since Lou but was still a place where you could have a good career, as long as you avoided the worst "neighborhoods". But Arvind made sure nothing of any value survived.
When a company betrays all of its workers, its culture and its principles it no longer deserves to survive.
@a4 things got way worse in Albany the last few years. They used to not do mass layoffs and didn’t use pips nearly to this extent
Here's the update — added a line about the hopelessness at the end of that paragraph:
In Albany, it's been this way for a long time — over a decade. Everyone knew about it: how the work always benefits the same small group, the favorites, every single time. But for the first time, it feels like people are actually speaking up about it, a shift from the days of turning a blind eye.
And while it's good that people are starting to push back on this corrupt system, it has a side effect: lowering morale. People used to suffer under this in silence. But saying it out loud now makes it more real. Knowing your colleagues see and feel the same thing brings the workplace mood down. And underneath it all is a creeping hopelessness the real sense that there's nothing you or anyone can actually do to change it. The values and culture here are sh-t. And we all just have eat sh-t and grin back and thank them for it.
I think a lot of people are feeling this. It is hard to maintain any real sense of loyalty or teamwork when people are constantly wondering about reorganizations, cuts, ratings and whether their role will still exist six months from now.
Once people stop believing the company is invested in them, they naturally stop investing as much of themselves in the company. You still do the work, but the energy, trust and sense of community gradually disappear.
The sad part is that those things take years to build and can be lost very quickly.