What is your direct experience with this situation at Cisco? What are the risks?
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All chasing maximum profit per employee, a ridiculous metric that sees employees as mere interchangeable pawns.
This is self contradictory. Each person brings unique skills and abilities to the table and good management knows how to get the best out of each to maximize productivity.
Cisco wants people to demonstrate "adaptability and versatility" by repeatedly assigning people to tasks they're least capable of doing which has resulted in vast mediocrity and when you look at metrics like the cost of customer found defects and the percentage of the development budget going to bug fixing Cisco is wasting billions of dollars in potential profit each year.
Work in a powder keg or find another gig. Your life, your choice. The thing is going nonlinear.
"someone at Cisco is going to twist off and go postal"
Layoffs happen everywhere. Microsoft (Azure specifically) is ruthless. Look at Broadcom with VMware. Oracle. Google. Amazon. All routinely conduct layoffs. All chasing maximum profit per employee, a ridiculous metric that sees employees as mere interchangeable pawns.
Just remember that it's never firecrackers. Run, hide, fight.
he-l shame buckley
@2txk+1pYxwHzc, no one is forcing anyone to stay at Cisco. I don't understand the thoughts behind the "threat of continual layoff". Sure, LR's are common and frequent at Cisco. But the severance package is very fair and better than many companies, so your choices are to stay the the understanding that you may get LR'd and have a half-year's salary to find a new job or find a new job and leave at your own choice on your own timing.
If Cisco simply paid out the 60-days in lieu of notice and that was it, then maybe I'd understand the "threat" comment. In that case, I don't think Cisco could keep, or hire, anyone to work under those conditions. Anyone who "snaps" and takes out their frustrations at being LR'd after this many years of Cisco having frequent LR's is just mentally unstable and shouldn't have been allowed to have their pew-pew in the first place. Not that I'm saying that I condone the actions you describe in either situation, severance or no severance.
Look, Dave, I can see you're really upset about this. I honestly think you ought to sit down calmly, take a stress pill and think things over.…
Sooner or later, someone at Cisco is going to twist off and go postal. Only so long people can be held under threat of continual layoff before something goes pop.
Take care of you, that’s your #1 priority. I’ve been where you are. I took a three week stress leave. I got help. Almost one year to the day, I was LRd. Anything before that would have been harassment. I found a new job before my 30 days were up and stayed.
Getting LRd was the best thing to happen. Why? Because all the anxiety and stories I was telling myself weren’t true. So after that I don’t give a $hit if they lay me off.
In the meantime, log HR tickets tracking your stress to protect yourself.
You’re in the wrong role. Don’t destroy your health for money. Take a less demanding job.
The stress will always be there.
We have two choices; either let it control us, or acknowledge it and learn to cope with the anxiety and mental challenge.
Each of us has to find our own coping method and live the path every day.
For me, it was forcing myself to get up every day and exercise from 5am to 6am.
No matter what, no matter how tired or sick I felt. Have literally been so sick that have thrown up (or worse) on the side of the road, at 5:15am, in the 45 degree rain.
It is more about strengthening your mind, your body is strengthened; also with time, but it is about mental toughness.
I lived panic and stress at Cisco. Lots of medication, long hours, sitting on my behind, alcohol to cope, and trying over and over to make people like me.
I was LR'd after almost eighteen years, almost had a nervous breakdown, and got counseling.
The person who changed my life was David Goggins. His path is not for everyone. Read his book "Can't Hurt Me". Simple message is toughen your mind through exercise. Extreme tough message to adopt.
I am still working in networking, five years after my LR; and more successful than ever financially. It su-ks though to keep the discipline. No food junk. Up at 0445. No medication. No drinking. But situations or people do not completely freak me out and panic me as they used to. What is the worse thing that will happen.
The answer lives inside you, taking leave is just a crutch to not deal with it head on.
Read David Goggins. Try to adapt. The fear will be there always. Try to learn to embrace it. We cannot live forever.
Your job is never going to be safe inthis[any] company.
I've never worked at a company that didn't have layoffs. I've never worked at a company without some kind of politics. Even nearly 25 years ago a background check and a 90 day probationary review were common at companies including Cisco, so an initial acceptance letter doesn't mean you'll still be working there four months later.
The collective you should be glad that your teeth didn't ki-l you at 20 or you weren't enslaved or ki-led in a war. Instead it's "why won't someone pay me six digits a year for life with no competitive expectations and no risk?" Stupid is winning at an exponential rate so enjoy what you have while you still have it.
If you're stressed because your job isn't safe, take a medical leave and find a job outside. Your job is never going to be safe in this company. Cost cutting is the only motivation for this ELT.
You can take an unpaid LOA which does not secure your job. If you claim short term disability, your job is secured but you will need a doctor's note which will require approval from Cisco's disability administrator, Sedgwick. You are not required to disclose the reason for your leave to your manager other than 'personal' or 'medical' nor should you. Check your Cisco benefits for the Employee Assistance Program (EAP) for counseling and the different types of LOAs available to you.
If it's work stress you have to get help to deal with that because once you're out on your own with no safety net you're losing money and market value which for those who took high school physics is an example of positive feedback. This means it will keep increasing your stress even more. Even with great jobs if it matters it comes with stress so just getting out of Cisco likely won't be enough.
If it's personal stuff like having to be a caretaker for a family member with a severe health problem you still need to get help dealing with the stress, and if this is the case hopefully others here who might have dealt with this already can provide more specific recommendations.
You are telling the world you are mediocre that's why you stay. Su-k it up
Stress unchecked lead to more serious mental health condition and need to be taken seriously. Not just an excuse. Cisco job can be very stressful cos so much to learn, so much sh-t, so much problems, always LR and sh-t managements confusing GTM and tons of stuffs that make you a lot unwells.
@apb+1pYxwHzc not many opportunities out there as the borrowing cost is too high. lotsa layoffs and the job market is sh-t.
So many opportunities out there. Think of Cisco as one of the stars under the sky at night. What’s the problem with these people.
Take a "ramp down" LOA. No salary, but your medical insurance is paid for a year. You need to be on good terms with your mgr and have at least 5 yrs service. Risk is that you may not have your job when you return from LOA. But, at Cisco you never know when you're going to be fired. So no diff. Take a ramp down. Like me, you probably won't want to return. There's so much more than Cisco out there.