Slashdot Mirror
After Uproar, Disney Cancels Tech Worker Layoffs
An anonymous reader writes: The NY Times previously reported that Disney made laid-off workers train their foreign replacements. The Times now reports that Disney has reversed its decision to lay off the workers and canceled training of the replacements. This follows public uproar, two investigations by the Department of Labor into outsourcing firms, complaints to the Justice Department, and calls for an investigation into the H-1B Visa program by Senator Bill Nelson. One of the workers said, "We were told our jobs were continuing and we should consider it as if nothing had happened until further notice." A former Disney employee who was forced to take an early retirement shared his personal thoughts on the matter in a Google+ post.
One of the workers said, "We were told our jobs were continuing and we should consider it as if nothing had happened until further notice."
Yeah, that notice will be updated employment terms to try to aggressive prevent people from leaking out the details when they attempt to do the H1-B swap the next time.
And start looking anyway. This is a temp stop gap to keep people from rioting, they'll hope the masses forget about it and can try this again in 6 months. Don't give them the chance, get out of dodge while you can
I'll totally just go back to my job now, with no loss in enthusiasm or loyalty. It's like nothing happened! Everything is okay. I will continue working for Disney and we'll be best friends forever.
Disney completed the layoffs of the Florida IT division (Walt Disney World)
This was ANOTHER set of layoffs for ABC Broadcasting comprising about 35 workers that were going to undergo the same process. ABC's has been halted but, AFAIK, the Florida IT division is still SOL.
What, was his MySpace account unavailable or something?
#DeleteChrome
Not only that, think of what kind of effect it has on morale......
like a doomesday counter or a count that shows the number of accident free days at work.
but this would be a constant reminder and a bloody nose to disney, how evil this h1b policy is and how evil DISNEY is.
'its been X days since disney last laid off US workers'. and when they do more evil shit, that counter gets reset (or, rather, its timestamp does).
too many ignorant americans have NO IDEA how fucked up disney is. they believe the hype and drink the koolaid and continue to buy their crotchfruit more and more disney merch.
people need to realize how evil this company is and that they are NOT worth giving your money to under any circumstances at all.
a public counter that stays up (yeah, disney has lots of lawyers so not sure how you can keep it running under pressure of lawsuit, even though it would be fair to have this be told about them) would really keep this issue alive, long after disney has buried it in the news.
disney should be the poster child of what is wrong with h1b. no one but us techies realize the h1b problem. the world needs to see this (at least the US does). disney might be the proper wake-up call to finally make people realize how badly we have sold our own people out ;(
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
The board should direct the termination of the executive responsible in such a way that it is termination for failing to abide by Disney, Florida and federal labor guidelines so that they don't get a severance. Since most of the employees are still there, there's no wrongful termination lawsuit they can bring against Disney so the risk to Disney by admitting that they caught an executive violating the rules and acted accordingly should be small.
Ok, so you thoroughly demotivate your workers. You insult them. You treat them like idiots. Yeah, we think so little of your jobs that we're going to import untrained minimum wage foreigners to replace you, and oh, by the way, before you leave, you have to train them which button to push when the light comes on.
You even complete the layoffs of one division. (Florida.)
And then, responding to Bad Press, as part of damage control, you tell the remaining employees that they get to keep their jobs. At least, for now, until the news cycle passes.
What employee in their right mind would *not* spend every moment looking for a new job at that point? What responsible individual (financially responsible to self and family) would *not* use this opportunity as paid job search?
So, Disney may have quieted down some small portion of the uproar. But they're still going to lose all of that tribal knowledge, guaranteed. And they're going to have the most disgruntled, (old workers) and nonfunctional (imported workers with no training or support) IT department of any company still in business.
I foresee a time when the Pirates of the Caribbean ride is populated with live H1-B actors, because nobody can figure out how to make the animatronics work anymore. Might be an improvement, except the guests will have to swim through the moat.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Important enough that they couldn't "just" be replaced by H-1B workers that were supposed to have skills that were unavailable in the US, the current employees were being required to train the H-1B workers in order to give them the skills and knowledge they needed to perform the job.
BTW, importance of the job has fuck-all to do with the boss getting their quarterly bonus for cutting payroll.
A company I used to work for in Orlando needed animators.
We got 300 applications from people at Disney. They referred to it as Mauschwitz.
Because they offer you severance pay and other benefits which you forfeit if you don't.
Disney is also a special case in Florida because it's THE major employer in the Orlando area. If you burn your bridges there, it's unlikely you'll work in that town again. (Not that it mattered because they were blocking people from coming back as contractors anyway but I think that's a legal issue issue, not a personal one - EG Contractors who worked at a company long term were found to be defacto employees by a court ruling against Microsoft several years ago - To get around that ruling contractors have to have a "rest" period of more than a year or else they might get to sue the company. I suspect Disney's actions for not hiring back the employees as contractors right away is probably to get around that.)
I sent Disney a mail to the office of the CEO and complained about the terrible treatment of those American workers (I am not American BTW) but I did get a reply and I like to think that everyone who did the same helped with the cause.
People laughed when I said I had done it, but it proves I did a tiny bit to help some jobs and I feel good, damnit :)
http://www.writeitfor.us - Writing IT for the IT generation.
I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it any further.
Perhaps you think you're being treated unfairly?
Good. You know it would be unfortunate if I had to leave a garrison here.
The most obvious one is the Disney Copyright Extension Act
After making piles of money on stuff from the public domain, Disney has fought to have copyrights almost perpetually extended. Almost every major film title Disney released for several decades was co-opting stuff in the public domain.
Di$ney is a ruthless corporation, always has been. They'll steam roll over anybody who gets in their way.
start here.
Honestly, if you've never heard any of this, you've been living under a rock for decades.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
EVERYBODY who's worked at Disney invariably refers to it as Mauschwitz (or Mouseswitz). The only other internal company name I've come across that's more universal is ex G.E. employees referring to it as "Generous Electric".
In my industry (steam and gas turbines), GE stands for "Good Enough".
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
It's a small world after all!
for 1099ers W2 contractors working for a firm / outsource don't fail under that rule.
That's an unfortunately common misunderstanding.
There are a lot of things bunched into the "contractor" name in recent years:
A. Working for a company under a 1099 tax reporting system, the person operates under their own business independent of the company. This is a real "independent contractor".
B. Working for a company under a W2 tax reporting system, the regular employee loses their job at the end of the temporary employment. This is a temporary worker or contingent employment.
C. Working for a company under a W2 tax reporting system, but that company is closely working with another company and the individual is assigned to work under their purview. This has many different names.
The guidelines they are supposed to use, which Microsoft and many others have gotten in trouble with, is when they bring in people in group A -- independent contractors under the 1099 tax system -- and treat them as though they are group B or C -- regular employees under the W2 tax system whose employment contract may or may not have a built-in termination date. This is mostly about tax differences, since the government generally gets less revenue from option A.
Many companies will bring in people through contracting companies like Deloitte or SAP. That is case C. These people are employed by one company as regular employees, and the two businesses have a working agreement. The individual is a regular worker and needs to have all the regular labor laws followed. This arrangement can happen for many years. Giving non-technical examples, you may have a car rental company with a single worker at an auto repair facility, or have building security hired through one company where the individuals report to work at the facility yet are hired, paid, and given other benefits by another business.
To confuse things, many times the companies involved in option C will hire their workers under option B. The workers are brought in from a separate company like Deloitte (option C), and those workers are hired by Deloitte as W2 workers with a temporary employment agreement (option B).
Unfortunately for workers, big companies often confuse the rules for them, calling them all "contractors" and dumping them under the same rules. Workers who were hired under option A must be able to work for additional groups. Companies get in trouble with option A when they keep the person too long since they stop looking like independent contractors and start looking like regular employees. When companies lay off lots of "contractors", usually they are laying off people under option B or C, but then refuse to hire them again because that is a rule for those under option A.
//TODO: Think of witty sig statement
I work for another company that has been doing this sort of thing for a long time. But instead of laying off employees and bringing on H1B's, they are bringing on recent college graduates that are also only H!B's and then making working conditions unbearable until the old timers here just leave out of frustration. There is such a high turn over rate here that we have all but stopped acknowledging when people leave. I am currently training 2 people and an expecting a third and I have to do this in addition to all other tasks that are assigned to me.
I miss the days when I could go to a first round in-person interview and get the job before walking out of the door. I am looking, but I am not having so much luck.
I think the problem is that many silicon Valley companies are employing these same sorts of strategies. Driving down wages by bringing in H1B's. Its like the management team reads in a business journal how all their competitors are doing this and they think that they have to do it too to keep up with the jones'. I think this is unethical and at worst, probably of questionable legality. theH1b program was designed to provide workers to supplement the workforce here because there weren't enough engineers to fill available positions. Now, the system is being used to replace engineers here with cheaper labor. This is not consistent with the intent of the provisions of H1b.
I feel conflicted...On one hand, Disney is yet again, being a shitty company and I feel bad that all these employees are being put through the wringer. On the other hand, if you are gullible enough to take a job at a company like Disney, you kind of deserve what you get.
I have a suspicion that a lot of Disney employees are like people that get jobs in the AAA game industry: They think that because they love the product that is produced, the job and working conditions will somehow be good.
Open message to anyone working for or thinking about it Disney: Research the companies history before you take a job These are shitty, shitty people that are in charge of making all these lovable characters.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
The only other internal company name I've come across that's more universal is ex G.E. employees referring to it as "Generous Electric".
When I worked at TI (Texas Instruments) in the 90's, it was pretty universally referred to as "Training Institute" because so many people would work there for a few years after college before going somewhere else. Some people also called it "Tiny Income". There's some truth to both. :)