Thread regarding American Electric Power Co. Inc. layoffs

The latest word on the street is all currently posted job openings are terminated, hiring freeze for the next 2 months, and a severance is forthcoming for the union employees. 40 million needs to come off O&M budget.

I had a great laugh with that last one, made my day.

Hey man if you want to risk fiery death in traffic just to go sit in an office every day no one is stopping you. Trying to drag the rest of us down with you is just sadistic.

The one thing that might accelerate a change in management is a return to the office. I know it stinks but if you look at the big picture most of the id--ts that TR brought with her are out of state and have no interest in moving to Columbus. They can't even do hybrid and would be forced out earlier than waiting for her to leave and to drag them with her. To get rid of them, we have to start putting it in Bill's ear that at least 3 days a week in the office is a necessary evil. The other BUs have too and IT should follow suit as a good example. I will hate going back downtown with the added expense but to get rid of the Minnesota Mafia, it might be worth it.

It takes everything I have just to go to work these days. It takes evening I have to just make it to lunch. And it takes everything I have not to vomit up that lunch by 2pm.

Never have the many suffered and sacrificed so much so the undeserving few could lavish themselves with unearned and undeserved rewards for their obscene self-aggrandizement.

I know, it feels like a meat grinder and they just don't care.

I feel so broken.

Most people just want a job yo pay bills, save for retirement, get the kids through college or better yet, trade school and go on vacation every year. Nothing major or out of the ordinary. Just your typical path in life. Keep the drama down to a minimum at work and home and everything is good. Then we start getting new managers in from the outside who think they know everything about the utility business and ruin it for everyone but themselves. Any failures are placed on the old guard or the employees just are not buying into the new method of doing something. Doesn't matter if it's a complete failure, has to be the employees fault for it not working out, has to be, it can't be my fault. Well it is, you su-k as a manager. You broke something that didn't need to be fixed.

Don't hold your breath. Looking back, you only see buy outs about every 8-10 year. Would be nice to know what the average age of company employees is.

I will be taking the next severence offered, no longer a place good to work/ career. Worst managed company I have ever seen- top to bottom. Hopefully they’ll offer again soon

Sounds exactly what our Managing Director did to our group. Told us to treat the TCS guys like co-workers and not contractors. Told us our jobs were not in jeopardy. TCS was there to make the entire support process better. She said with a straight face, it was not about cutting jobs. Told us we had to train all of them as part of the Co-sourcing program. Well, 6 months later, the majority of the team was let go because of costs. Take the year salary and sign a NDA or no $$$ and unemployment benefits. They knew from day one it was all about the job cuts. Go back and read what they did at Target, JCP, Country Financial, it's always been about cutting jobs for TCS. Wonder how much of a kick back TR is getting from TCS. Sanjay took one for Team Therace when he got caught putting his thumb on the scale for TCS.
To Therace, you and all of your cronies su-k but at some point karma is a bi--h. I just hope I'm around to see you fired for what you did to this company.

So I’m one of those who was laid off back in January. Really cordial how lice resident, Bruce Jenner, shotg-nned the impersonal “as of now your position has been eliminated” cr-p. No thank you for making AEP successful through the many years of hard work and free overtime. Me, I was a su---r and believed training new people that came to the team, following up on their progress, making sure they were becoming productive to make AEP successful was a good thing and just made us better to serve our customers with the delivery of work at reasonable costs and the utmost quality. No, that was a mistake. Anyone out there now who thinks training new people to your team will make you valuable to your company is a su---r. They will just take the new guy / your replacement and keep them while they dump you. Lesson learned. Keep all your work secrets to yourself. Do not train new people/ your future replacement. Life is better after AEP. Hopefully the dark cloud of trolls running things there is sent away soon.

Poll...
Thumbs up if you think IT is BETTER off now than before TR?
Thumbs down if you think we're WORSE off!

The severances will continue until morale improves. Crony corporate management just cannot understand why they are out of a job. When only the sycophantic cronies are left no work gets done but corporate management's egos have never been so well stroked. Virtuous professional leadership would have never allowed it to come to this. Go to college to get drunk and engage in debauchery does not instill values, discipline or a resolute determination to succeed. Enlist in the military, serve your nation, learn what it takes to be an American patriot and learn that values, responsibility, shared sacrifice, cohesiveness, selflessness and discipline are essential to be professional and succeed as a team. In the absence of resolute virtue, self aggrandizing tyranny flourishes and failure becomes reality.

Everyone complaining about TR but all the directors+ got nice ICP this year. They ate while the rest of us got scraps.

You may be right, I think most people just want the company to return to some sense of normalcy. The cuts, the lack of direction, the lack of leadership, outsourcing with offshore people that could care less about our company.

This thread has become full on tin hat mode.

I know that the DEI was forced upon and is a liberal cause. However I worked at AEP for a decade an half. I was a strong republican. Over the years of working there, I wad sc--wed over the most by strong republican belivers managers. Having experinced that, I dont think I can value Republicans as much. I am a veteran, but have been sc--wed over by other veteran who were in manager positions. I just wonder why Paul Chodak left and Toby Thomas. Was it because they are tru leaders and did not believe in the direction the company was going. If thst is true, I still have belief in American companies and lesdership. Thr last few years in AEP have disgusting fot policy and decisions. Tokenism is a real term in DEI. Voming from tbr miltary, diversity was everything. If you want diversity go to a militaty baracks. There is no real reason why Tokenism existed in AEP DEI strategy, except it wad a fake move toward diversity.

ICP: Carrot tied to the end of a long stick, employees chase and never obtain. End this rigged illusion of an incentive program and allow employees to earn the rewards they deserve. Stealing shared prosperity to further enrich corporate management and major shareholders is virtue-less crony capitalism. Without management employees would earn what they deserve, without employees management does not exist.

Throught out AEP you will find self centered leadership. Leaders who have rised quickly through the ranks without out a care who thry trampled over. You can tell if you work for obe by the high turnover rate of employees that have workrd for them. What I mean is the individuals that helped this person rise are no longer with the company or at a dead end position. Meanwhile this leader is posting fast expensive cars on facebook or bragging about their second home.
They dont care. Very privaleged individuals. They hide their privallsge by telling others they are privalleged

I dare corporate management to offer frontline employees another severance. They will be managing a ghost workforce. Frontline employees have earned and deserve real leadership, not these parasitic, self-serving, major shareholder crony collaborators.

Let's see if the cost cutting takes out the DEI department like it has at other companies. For me, the ROI is zero for that department. They have to be there looking for a solution to an issue that doesn't exist. The cuts hurt some departments a lot. Some of that could have been offset by getting rid of the department that shows zero benefit to the customer or shareholders, let alone to the employees.

The DEI stuff was a fad that burned through corporate America like a cancer but I think most of it is on the way out. Some places got hit a lot worse. For a Fortune 500 company it was relatively mild here thankfully. I agree that inviting Tim Wise to come give his "white people are evil" speech was disgraceful.

When you hire someone to come in and to basically tell all the white employees your a racist, I knew at that point the company lost its collective mind.

I wonder if AEP will put in their next 100 years booklet. Early 2020s AEP forgot their most valuable resource, humans. They also forgot their purpose, produce and transport energy. Stop forcing political garbage and get back to company values. Hire and promote people on theit abilities to serve a mission to produce powerto our communties. If you wanted to be a poltician join that industry, but leave ours out of it. Most all of us wanted was a job in the utility industry. Now we are puppets in an environment that is not inclusive to why I joined the company and the service we provide.

As a veteran and over 10 years with AEP, your skills from being in the service are not transferable in the current environment at AEP. Skills and experience went away. The company will have a hard time recovering and become a leader in the energy industry. It lost it way trying to be equitable. AEP's layout of DEI was toxic to many employees. I know if I could choose to buy my energy from a different company i would. Culture matters, not only to employees but also customers. Employees are your customers as well.

How many more to be severed or discharged this fall ? Word is more cuts coming, eliminating entire groups to reduce the O+M costs

All of this goes back to when the company turned its focus on ESG instead of the triangle, Employees, Shareholders and last but not least, the customers. As the Board changed to a more "diverse" collection of folks, the focus shifted to ESG and DEI. You want to vote it this down, go ahead, facts don't care about your feelings. As a long-term employee [30+ yrs.] and Veteran I've watched it all from a good vantage point based on my job. I'm the guy that sits in meetings without saying a word, but I soak it all in and I keep track of who's who. To the other Vets, you are not alone, and you are correct, the company is only playing lip service to the Vets to get a point on some meaningless survey from JD Powers. The are more interested in the "woke" groups to keep from getting on their "bad" side. At some point, AEP will get the Bud Light treatment, and they have it coming.

The problem in the company right now is only a few people are allowed to express how they dont feel included or valued as much as others. A veteran says they dont feel as valued as others they are voted down. A true inclusive company culture might look at that comment and say maybe we could do better, but he-l what does this veteran know.

The company values have changed. It used to be a place where being a veteran mattered. Now it is sll about s-xual preference and gender. Being a veteran is worthless in this company and country.

It's pretty obvious TCS business model. We will provide 10 techs for $10k each plus our commission/cut with no benefits. That leaves the company the ability to get rid of 5 FTEs with benefits and save the cost of 3 of them while using the other 2 to pay for the contract. There is never a reference to quality in any of the contracts because they can't match the FTEs. You get what you pay for. I tell users to complain up the chain on their end and let the cr-p hit the fan on our side. I tell them I won't take it personally and the worse they can make it sound, the better To management, yes I have been throwing as many wrenches into the process as possible from day one. I knew you people were going to treat us like cr-p so why should I do you any favors in making things run smoothly. TCS techs are cr-p, they don't listen, they don't learn anything on their own. They have to be spoon fed everything and have no clue how to use a search engine. So until either I leave or they do, they are not my friends, they are no my co-workers, they are scabs (learned that from my Dad who's a union member) plain and simple. The sooner they and upper mgmt leave the better. I will welcome the day when I can stop pretending to be nice to you and TCS.

Overall If you look at the personal, selfishness, and greed they possess its pretty amazing they are able to sell such a destructive plan to companies. These are soulless people. They are passing through with no interest in making the company better, collecting what they can and moving on. I just wish they would hurry up. It also wouldn't surprise me if TCS being as large as they are, having a "special task force" to strategicly pull Companies into its trap and su-k the life out of it. just really su-ks picking up the pieces of what's been destroyed. At some point you have to ask is the juice worth the squeeze.

Just takes one person, just one. Who wants to draw straws? Someone said something about the company removing the comments from AEPnow, I wonder if anyone has asked TR to explain why IT is in such a mess under her leadership? Bet it only happens once.

Hey TR, you gonna be on any employee webcast or are laying low hoping you don’t get exposed in front of Bill.
Here are some questions for the webcast moderator since no one can or will ask through the company process out of fear of retaliation.
Can you balance your own checkbook?
Whose budget are you gonna steal this year when you mis-manage AEP funds for 2024?
Have you delivered any value to any BU since joining or are you just getting use to canceling initiatives? No, Tech talks aren’t value add.
Do you know how a reg utility works yet?

It amazes me that all of the upper mgmt staff that reports to TR are able to con an entire organization from the very beginning without Nick and the Board's knowledge. They had to have agreed to her "vision" for IT and gave her full control to sc--w it up so bad nobody would care as long as it was cheaper. Forget about quality, it was all done to save a buck. Nevermind who or what was damaged in the process. I swear these people have no soul to do this to multiple companies, no matter how lives they destroy. Just a group of heartless ah oles.

I also remain overly cautious because they used these same abstractions and lies the last 3 years. I believe that it's an illusion of success, in the hopes of a better culture survey result.

I would say you're most likely right about no more severances but that we're good at this point, I'll have to disagree. Other than the new CEO, still waiting for the CITO head to roll along with a number of her cronies. After that happens, I'll then say we're on the road to recovery. If it doesn't happen, call the morgue, this IT shop is DOA.

I think most of the drama/excitement is over… I could be wrong. But I think we must be doing fine and will have no more issues. Severances were probably a waste of resources too.

I loved all the comments ,great place for information and always a good laugh.