Like our leader, I've been through six of these downturns, and can tell you this time it's different.
In the past, the people-cutting started with expensive management and reducing layers in addition to non-management employees. Attempts at zero basing occured and therefore the cuts could be horrific. It was used also as a house cleaning. Accountabilty reined for a bit. This time the incestuous cronyism keeps incompetent management around. The lying losers in exploration are still in charge! Most BU presidents are there because they are liked by someone above rather than being a true leader.
In the past there was a small bit of humility of the unknown, perhaps caused by fear. Now there's only arrogance and ignorance. Yes, these guys are smart and experienced, but they don't know how to listen and have not learned from their experience.
In the past the technical and financial guys had a seat at the table. Our "leader" explaining Eagleford having negative earnings because he doesn't agree with resources versus reserves is a hyper-level of ignorance, incompetence, and arrogance. People are spending money on projects that are not making money and not creating value. Instead of looking for simple reasons why, they make up these complicated stories when in truth their crony friends are spending money because this is how they are rewarded.
In the past, cuts were deep enough to even out in the end to kind of match with reduced work. Now, the layers and management are still here, and there is no work.
In the past, they did not go cra-cra with spending while times were good. Closing down the center makes sense, but plans were to actually expand: the company purchased the housing behind the Omni in addition to the twin towers. Management also felt confident about admitting they had planned for too much in past downturns. Now they mothball an executive jet (and blame it on aviation at VCIP time) rather than admit the loss on the lease because they are afraid to look stupid. Hey, we know!
These arrogant vastly overpaid a$$hats have not learned from their experiences this time, so things will continue to go poorly. Young employee should use this time to train for an external job. Me, I'll stick around and play this out, I have almost zero work so my hourly pay is approaching infinity.