If you are a bottom 5%, expect to be cut at anytime. This happens at all companies. Don’t believe the booted sour grapes posting here frequently who claim to have jobs paying more than they used to get at Cisco. Why do such losers keep coming here time and time again?
45 replies (most recent on top)
Clearly the OP here was wrong....
I am not worried about layoffs since my boss is well connected and it helps we are both from India.
It's easy for a manager to say you're in the bottom 5%. However, is that really the case if you haven't had a pay rise in over 5 years, you've been a grade eight all that time and you're a competent worker. I think it's more realistic to say the individual's decided you're getting what you paying for!
+1
I was at Cisco long enough to see workforce reductions that targeted the bottom 5%. Some of those targets were true poor performers and some were political targets by managers out to get rid of them for whatever reason. Back then, it took time & effort for a manager to get you onto a PIP and set you up to fail to meet your documented goals so they could let you go. Now, it's much easier without the formal reviews. Now, under the people deal, it's very easy to target the older, higher compensated employees.
Also, people should get over it, big deal you were laid off, the valley has a million tech jobs out there. Still being bitter years of the fact is just really, really sad.
Not all the Cisco employees impacted are "in the valley" and there are not a million tech jobs where they live. Being forced to uproot your family to move to take the next big job will cause bitterness. After years of listening to Chambers talk about the "Cisco family" and then watching how the frequent LR's are now handled, it's easy to be bitter.
@PnoBea9-4iku - The way Cisco buys companies, it's easy to see a high-performer ending up in Cisco.
@xhn.....try being a high performer and getting LR'd. I suspect your tune might change towards the bitter range.
Why would a high performer work at Cisco? High performance & quality do not align to Cisco culture.
Certainly entertaining thread. There are no layoffs on the horizons, unless you are over 45, in CDO or GSP, not lgbt, of European decent or pale in skin colour, and heterosexual male.
+1 to ats - the op is either a troll, works for csco hr, stuck in the basement with his parents or all three.
Working at CSCO is a privilege not a right.
Working for Google, Facebook etc may be a privilege. Working for Cisco is a punishment for not having studied hard in grad school.
I concur with the OP. Besides, CSCO is not a union shop. Working at CSCO is a privilege not a right.
@2abm which BU?
Dirka dirks dirka
NAME THE INDIAN AT CISCO GAME! 1 in 5 chance their name starts with an "Sh"... just add an asterisk. "Sh-Asterisk!"
Cisco don't care me so I like to hide now. Code a little, load up on free snacks, fill my backpack with apples and bananas to feed the familys, be a little visible by doing ppt for my poorly qualified supervisor, drop my code load, then look for new group to hide for next years. It's like game. And every night I walk home to the nearby new built tech ghetto off Tasman.
1mgd +1, it changes in a heartbeat. All it takes is one bad leader backed by other unaccountable snakes.
@PnoBea9-1env - Eerily accurate commentary on life at Cisco, I've witnessed this occur on numerous occasions.
The OP must really be having a great year at Cisco. Congratulations! If you stay long enough, you’ll inevitably be at the wrong place, at the wrong time, working for the wrong person.
You’ll be let go; unless you are a spectacular politician…and if that’s the case; are you really fulfilling your destiny at Cisco…shouldn’t you really be running for public office with your political skills?
Especially as a long-term individual contributor, you can and should (if you are in the right place) have a few great productive years, if aligned with great management, great stakeholder and customer success. Enjoy the ride.
Suddenly something will happen (reorganization, a few key people move on, you suddenly are re-organized to report to a snake-oil politician) …and fate will wreck your little Cisco glass house. When you least expect it, expect it. You can go from XE, boatloads of CAP awards, promotions, bonuses; to the baggage your new boss wants to flush down the LR-toilet. It just takes a few quarters.
The irony is, the success you experience during your great years, which will hopefully result in raise in paygrade and salary; will later become the LR target, especially if you are parked under a snake-oil politician, as they send you out the door.
Don’t drink the Kook-Aid and think that you are somehow different. The good news is, when you cross LR-rainbow bridge you will no longer wake up at 4AM, worrying about a project, or mostly how to make your newly acquired through re-organized snake-oil manager happy with PowerPoints and politically rewarding BS metrics.
@PnoBea9-1env You nailed it. SPOT ON. Can't believe people really drink the Cisco Kool-aid or from ANY large corporation. Never again, never again. We all live and learn. Find your purpose and identity in life from something besides corporate America.
The OP must really be having a great year at Cisco. Congratulations! If you stay long enough, you’ll inevitably be at the wrong place, at the wrong time, working for the wrong person.
You’ll be let go; unless you are a spectacular politician…and if that’s the case; are you really fulfilling your destiny at Cisco…shouldn’t you really be running for public office with your political skills?
Especially as a long-term individual contributor, you can and should (if you are in the right place) have a few great productive years, if aligned with great management, great stakeholder and customer success. Enjoy the ride.
Suddenly something will happen (reorganization, a few key people move on, you suddenly are re-organized to report to a snake-oil politician) …and fate will wreck your little Cisco glass house. When you least expect it, expect it. You can go from XE, boatloads of CAP awards, promotions, bonuses; to the baggage your new boss wants to flush down the LR-toilet. It just takes a few quarters.
The irony is, the success you experience during your great years, which will hopefully result in raise in paygrade and salary; will later become the LR target, especially if you are parked under a snake-oil politician, as they send you out the door.
Don’t drink the Kook-Aid and think that you are somehow different. The good news is, when you cross LR-rainbow bridge you will no longer wake up at 4AM, worrying about a project, or mostly how to make your newly acquired through re-organized snake-oil manager happy with PowerPoints and politically rewarding BS metrics.
LOL.
A year before I got kicked out the door, a former boss of mine went. There's no way he was under performing - he did a lot for his site and his team, and played the game very very well. He repeatedly refused promotion to VP because he didn't want to move to the US. Not a bottom 5%.
On my last day, I was followed into the HR office by one of the best people in my BU.
If either of those people were PIPped prior to LR, it absolutely would have been political (this was of course prior to the "removal" of performance "ratings")
OP, bless your heart. Enjoy the taste of that Kool-Aid while you still have a stomach lining.
+1
I am an indian guy..38...top performer..at G10...got laidoff last yr in Aug 2016 after being 9.5 yrs with cisco...
The reason I think was my salary was higher than my peers who were at G11..
ok that was it....got a new job within 1 month with 8% raise...ok thats not much...1 yrs later today moving to another company with 25% more..so in total getting 35% more than in cisco...
At G10 I was at 132k USD base...go figure...
those in this sh--hole will never understand that..
Glassdoor is also filled with reviews written by HR.
This is simple, folks. OP just hasn't hit the point in their career where they've learned that documentation matters. Must be newish to corporate land. The language is all there, steeped in ego.
OP: When you get PIP'd and have nothing to point at to challenge it, think back on this thread as you head out the door. It will happen; either at Cisco, or any other place too lazy to consider employee development a thing.
Q: Why should they spend resource to develop you if they can just hot-swap you?
A: Welcome to being nothing ever more than a FRU.
Personally, I want more than that for my career. Individual mileage may vary.
OP must be on crack. If he believes there are no more layoffs and only pruning...
WHY the F come to this website in the first place? Are you worried? Hahaha total idiot.
WOW A classic example of believing HR propaganda who cover up Cisco's underperformance in the market. 2 years of revenue drops means something is wrong. Therefore to cut costs a company lays off.
You must be a brand new @$$ kissing employee or on crack because no long tenure Cisco employee would believe no layoffs will happen after 2 years of revenue decreases and 26,000+ layoffs in the past 5 years!!
What a crazy post!!
Unreal to see how some employees actually believe HR crap
Easy to spot posts authored by Cisco HR. Guys, stick to Glassdoor.
+1 OP is an a---kisser because that's how you stick around.
+1
LR or reward has nothing to do with what your contributions are. In Engineering, it has to do where you were from. For some unknown reasons, VPs and Directors are nearly all from South Asia. Only this group is rewarded and protected.
Not a lot.
This means those left in the US which are mainly Indians are the top performers while most of those laid off (whites) are the under performers.
What is wrong with this picture?
PnoBea9-hex,
You shouldn't need a performance review to know if you are in the bottom 5 percent. Are you getting your work done on time, or earlier? Do you come into the office and actually work, or do you do like 2 hours of a work a day, come in at 10:30 and leave at 2 and talk with coworkers with most of the time instead of working? Do you actually know what you are doing or are you constantly asking questions on how to do the easiest things?
Bottom 5% is easy to recognize. If you are not sure if you are in the bottom 5%, you probably are.
Unfortunately my manager has a 1:1 with me every Friday for 10-15 min, which is honestly a pain in the rear, but whatever. Just a quick what did you finish and what are you doing, I've been here 5 years and gone from grade 8 to 10 with promotions roughly every 2 years, so that might be a factor as well to all the people who complain that they get laid off after years of no raise or promotion.....maybe that should be a hint as well as to what percentage you are included in.
+1 - happened to me
OP, s--- it.
How would you know if you are bottom 5% if you don't have performance reviews.
How are performance reviews a waste of time? Won't you want to know what you did well, what didn't go as expected, how you could improve? Shouldn't these be documented somewhere so you know you won't be unnecessarily thrown under the bus?
When was the last time you had a 1:1 with your manager to discuss what you are doing, any issues you are facing, etc?
This is what is wrong with Cisco.
One day you will called the top performer and the next day you will be put on PIP. None of them can be countered because you don't have any proof.
You're wrong. In my 9 years at Cisco I never received below an E or "Strong" on my performance review, yet I was let go in August of last year. In those 9 years I NEVER got a raise. Most companies give at least a 2%-3% bump per year... not Cisco. I'm now working for a Cisco partner making 40% more than I was making working for Cisco.
In my experience, the people impacted by layoffs didn't have a good network at Cisco. Layoffs have nothing to do with performance, hell the company doesn't even have performance reviews. At Cisco, it's all about who you know.
I do find it funny and actually kind of sad that the majority of posters here are the ones who were already laid off and can't just let it go. My department has let go of exactly 1 person over the last 3 years, and that person was the worst at their job in our department by far. As for reviews, thank god we don't have to fill those things out anymore, it felt like work stopped for a few days because of those things. If there really are top performers laid off they will have zero problem finding a new job. The ones who were the bottom 5%, which everyone I have seen the past 10 years who were laid off were obviously there, they should maybe find a new career field, because let's face it most Cisco talent is not the cream of the crop. Also, people should get over it, big deal you were laid off, the valley has a million tech jobs out there. Still being bitter years of the fact is just really, really sad.
+1
Saw it happen to at least a dozen what would be "Top 5%" employees over the last 36 months. Of course there is no formal scoring system anymore. It's all just backroom spreadsheets. As someone else said here recently, its all about the "Shadow Snipers" now.
+1 to -ats. To the OP, you are deluded.