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IT Workers Facing Layoffs Jolted By CEO's Message (computerworld.com)
HCSC recently announced layoffs for more than 500 IT workers, and expects them to train their replacements from an India-based contractor. But a few days earlier, CEO Paula Steiner said, "As full-time retiring baby boomers move on to their next chapter, the makeup of our organization will consist more of young and non-traditional workers, such as part-time workers or contractors." dcblogs quotes ComputerWorld:
What Steiner didn't say in the employee broadcast is that some of the baby boomers moving "on to the next chapter" are being pushed out the door. "Obviously not all of us are 'retiring' -- a bunch of us are being thrown under the bus," said one older employee.
The insurance provider argues that its members want easier technology solutions that "help keep rising costs in check. Our IT teams are being transformed...focusing on those and other member needs." But Slashdot reader ErichTheRed writes: Having a CEO actually say in public that their company wants to engage in age discrimination and eliminate full-time employment, rather than just carry out the work in secret, is new to me... for those mid- to late-career technical folks, how have you managed to adjust to new realities like this?
The insurance provider argues that its members want easier technology solutions that "help keep rising costs in check. Our IT teams are being transformed...focusing on those and other member needs." But Slashdot reader ErichTheRed writes: Having a CEO actually say in public that their company wants to engage in age discrimination and eliminate full-time employment, rather than just carry out the work in secret, is new to me... for those mid- to late-career technical folks, how have you managed to adjust to new realities like this?
Those H1B's are just there to "temporarily" fill a lack of skilled workers.
Om, nomnomnom...
So the replacement workers the Americans are being forced to train before getting shoved out the door are from India?
This could make a great "different cultures" comedy...maybe even a rom-com. It would go like this: one of the fresh young faces hires the Boomer who just trained her and got kicked out of the corporation to be her nanny. They could call it "Scumbag Millionaire".
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
This is not the first time we've read about laid-off employees being expected to train H-1B replacements. But I've also seen numerous statements that it's illegal to do that. I realize many companies like to play fast and loose with laws, but - why aren't we seeing lawsuits from people in that position? I know some people will be scared they might lose their retirement or severance... but I can't imagine every single person affected would be too scared to sue.
#DeleteChrome
I saw 50 year olds being laid off when in 1980 when I was entering the field. And that's when we had stronger age discrimination protection (pre 2009 gutting by SCOTUS) and no H1B's.
If you are lucky or a genius (top 1% in your field), you'll be fine. otherwise, count on being dumped on the street without warning at about 45 to 54 years old. If we can get the ACA correctly in place, it would reduce some of the incentive ( "self" insuring corporations realize that older people cost a lot more for insurance starting about age 45 and want to dump them unless they have critical skills).
The next 20 years are going to be bad. A glut of older workers with no savings willing to work at anything to keep from starving. Meanwhile fields like Trucking with 3 million employees may practically vanish over 5 years and the new jobs will only be open to 20 year olds trained in the new technologies (and they may not find enough jobs either- the 30 year olds I know are all about 8 years behind my generation to reach their first cars, first homes, etc.) and I was about 8 years behind my parents generation.
When your skills are hot, save half what you make until you have enough to live until age 80 if you lose your job. If your job is stable, buy a house because that will fix your monthly payments. The house payment stays about $1200 a month while the apartment rent goes from $1200 to $1800 over a decade. Sure there are repairs but get home owners insurance and learn to change a washer and patch sheetrock (EASY for IT types).
Management is good money for 4-8 years but a dead end (layoffs). Getting some critical, complex skill that can't easily be outsources is good. And as long as indian language skills suck, business analysts are going to be safe for a while.
Over time- packages are going to become more common. You purchase them and configure them but you don't code them. Problem is they can be replaced with a new hot package you don't get trained in without warning.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
This is how you get out of this situation. When you get out of school, pay down your debt, budget, save, invest, and decide what it means to "need" something versus "want" something. By the time you're 40, you should be glad someone is going to show you the door.
The American worker is not safe without organized protection, which only doctors and lawyers have managed to maintain. If you're going to refuse to organize because you're "too smart and unions are bad," then at least work to protect yourself. Because when it comes time to be laid off, it's a bit too late to say "that'll never be me."
I know a few lawyers that would jump on that comment. Of course "health care" businiesses in general and HCSC in particular are notoriously disinterested in anything but the management's pay checks and bonuses. What other sector would pass out mugs that read "May Your Cup Always be Half Full" - no joke.
------ The only greater hazard to your liberty than n politicians is n+1 politicians.
Quote from her biography on the HCSC web site (last paragraph):
That quote says she is involved with the management of 5 other organizations.
"... MBA from the Wharton School." Not a background of someone who understands computer technology.
I'm guessing that people who work there will call to have a computer problem fixed and will talk to someone who doesn't speak English well and who has very little knowledge of computer technology. That has happened to me numerous times involving several companies.
On slash dot last week Ask Slashdot: What Training Helps Older Programmers Most?
Or you could check if Elon Musk needs workers/volunteers to help with the Mars project.
Walk out together without training any replacements. This is what labor unions are for.
Force your employer into a situation it cannot handle by itself. It needs its workers and will stop functioning if enough workers walk out.
Enough. This Tuesday, it will be time to make I.T. great again. Those who'd have sanctimonious cries of "its a global economy" can talk to the hand. These kinds of layoffs are only possible because of the horrible decisions of corporate executive multimillionaires and billionaires to offshore all of our jobs for the personal gain of a few. Greed at the top masquerading as globalist capitalism is destroying our economy. For the first 10-year period in modern history, America never exceeded 3% GDP growth in any year.
"Hillary Clinton, one of the leading Democratic presidential candidates, supports increasing the cap on H-1B Visas. She argues that foreign skilled workers contribute a great deal to the American economy, and increasing the cap will help push technological development forward in the United States."
https://www.prideimmigration.com/hillary-clintons-position-on-increasing-the-h-1b-visa-cap/
This is why you see tech companies so strongly supporting Hillary. Apparently not voting in support of job killing globalism makes you a racist.
As full-time [LEGALLY PROTECTED CLASS] move on to their next chapter, the makeup of our organization will consist more of [LEGALLY PROTECTED CLASS] and non-traditional workers, such as part-time workers or contractors
This is how this should read. Fill in whatever you want in the blank, they should all be illegal, and admitting it should be grounds for a nice easy lawsuit. Unfortunately for HCSC, asshole is not a protected class.
The conservatives shat on the Unions time and time again to where they barely even exist now. This is what you get. You asked for this bed. Lay in it. I already got mine.
Maybe the smartest, most prescient movie ever written, here's towards the end: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcpWk2WKhEM
It does make you racist. There's simply no other way to put it. America's way of doing things is just like Microsoft- America's biggest company at one time. Extend, Embrace, Extinguish. We don't close ourselves off to the world. If we want whatever idea put down, we let them come here and we convert them. We shove freedom fries and ford trucks in their faces and show them what kind of world they can have if they'd only stop fucking goats and blowing shit up. And see, that statement right there is racist but I've never claimed otherwise. I notice the differences between cultures and races and act accordingly. If it is one I don't like, then I leave it be. What's truly racist is to advocate hate, violence, and other vile things on others just because of their race and I don't do that (and I didn't see you say that either). For instance, black folks shouldn't be hung or put back in the fields, but dammit you're an idiot if dude ain't gonna love the shit outta ya for coming over with a bucket of chicken and some 40s! Tell me I'm lyin'!
That's antiquated thinking and that CEO is an idiot. Given enough time that company will cease to exists or be eaten by a larger entity.
Better to be shoved out the door now than when that company collapses. Sounds like 500 people should go get some funding and build a better company.
"What difference – at this point, what difference does it make?"
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
All these companies want is cost saving. Be warned... garbage in, garbage out. These companies will get what they pay for. Instead of hiring from abroad you could easily hire from your local high school, train a kid, help families here, and receive the same quality of employee with little to no knowledge of real I.T. work. I will not support any company that has a policy of firing experienced technical workers in favor of cheap inexperienced labor from the other side of the world.
Yes, competition sucks. Welcome to the global economy.
That cushy job you call "yours" actually belongs to your employer. You are paid at the owners' discretion.
OK, having said all that, I can tell you that, in all probability, the idiots in charge will be furiously back-pedaling in a few years, once they realize that you get what you pay for. I've been through this. Upper management has strictly no clue what IT even does, but they understand the bottom line. If some Indian IT consulting company offers services at bargain basement prices, they don't ask too many questions. To them, IT services are fungible.
If you were good at your job, you might be able to get it back at that point. Of course, if you were good, you probably found something better in the meantime. In that case, you will be thanking your current employer for giving you the kick in the ass you needed to get on with your life.
Might makes right irrelevant.
Mark Spencer fell through the Buzzword Tree and hit every branch on the way down, except maybe the Synergy branch:
Table-ized A.I.
Have American IT workers ever joined together, and successfully stood up to planned replacements with H-1Bs, forcing the company to change their mind and keep the American employees?
Or have so many of a company's IT employees left without training their replacements (even though that cost them some pay), that the company's ID department had a hard time?
Apparently only 20% of the readers care about this.
the people being replaced should walk out, by whatever means (pretending you're depressed is a good way) on the day the replacements are supposed to arrive, and never come back, period !
Right-O ! Way to Go!
Depress the workers, shock them into scrambling to find other employment fast, put a few percent on welfare, and piss off the old farts!
That spells short-term bonuses for upper management.
Oh, don't forget - we need to hire some better security guards to prevent a 'postal rampage' through the corporate offices!
And when the upper management calls to ask for a short-term contractor, go ahead and do it.
But continually ask the indian IT people how to do everything.....
I used to think the book 'Atlas Shrugged' was about an infantile way of thinkng - "if I dont get my way I wont do anything..."
Now I think it represents a non-union way to force the hand of the people making stupid decsions.
Labor shifting is a consequence of cost savings from location shifting. This has nothing to do with any US visa complaints, however unfounded.
Hold it! I thought the HB-1s were hired for their pre-existing expertise...
So why do they need training?
more and more data thefts are occurring. These out-sourced outfits taking over entire IT departments are largely maintainers, not designers. They have no chance of keeping up with today's hackers.
I don't really oppose or support higher levels of immigration; from my own selfish perspective it isn't clear which is better. Legal immigration basically just increases the US population, which I'm not sure has a positive or a negative effect. (I work at a company started by a guy who came here from Jordan, and before that I made pretty good money working in SV for two guys from Russia and Pakistan, so that affects my opinion a bit.)
Illegal immigration- the kind that really obsesses people- affects me by letting me buy cheaper strawberries. They're picked in the hot sun by people making $1.50 an hour. I'm not worried about not getting a job picking strawberries- nobody is when McDonalds is still hiring. I'm more worried about expensive strawberries. It may be immoral to exploit people like this, but this is a good racket we've got going and if we were smart, we wouldn't let our xenophobia blind us to the artificially low cost of groceries- at least not until strawberries can be picked by robots.
Outsourcing is a different beast altogether. The economic impact is much worse when the job moves overseas, or (same thing) is filled by an H1-B who earns little money here and then takes it back home instead of spending it here. Companies save fistfuls of money this way and they tend to stuff it into their mattresses.
In corporation that pays for my bread and butter there is a propaganda dep which sends regularly mails about glorious attempts at different well meant policies. Recently I (and the whole company) got a mail in which this department of truth stated that in order to avoid discrimination of the young a policy of decreasing the average age of employees were to be executed. This was supposed to help company to be more innovative etc. It apparently did not occur to the author that this mail is announces an open discrimination of the old farts (like me). I was just about to inquire this in 'answer all' post when a friend of mine soberly pointed out that my package can be in danger if I did. I still wonder about legality of this mail. It is firmly on local disc and in a backup just in case the said package is not satisfactory.
A colleague of mine went to a company "town hall" meeting, basically trying to figure out if his job would be gone in the next year.
He got talking with one of the speakers, who posed the following question(s): "Can your job be done remotely? If so, can you think of a good reason it shouldn't be?"
A lot of jobs in IT and Telecoms can be done remotely, and C-level management will not feel any particular reason not to offshore if they can get away with it. Even if there are serious issues with a given project, management will likely just try to engage a few people onshore as contractors to supervise for a while.
Newer have understanded how replacing people that all ready know the system helps reduce costs? It cant be good to bring in tons of people that dont even properly speak the language, newer the less know how systems works...
These jobs were going away anyway and the company is just hiring under paid, overworked slave labor as a way to keep themselves profitable for a while longer....enevitably they are going to fail or be bought out.
...that I am getting sick and tired of talking to non-English speaking people on the phone. This is America not India, China, Indonesia, Bangladesh, or wherever these people are from. I seriously thought about calling the customer service department of anywhere that I am going to purchase something, whether that be goods or services, and see if they speak English before making my purchase. All of these companies using H1-B vistas can go to hell!
What has been lost and forgotten is the value of a well trained, talented, competent, productive employee. This is due to the failure of accounting to provide useful, meaningful, insightful reports to management. And, probably, it is due to management being incompetent to understand the reports.
I do support at Big Corp whose customers are also Big Corps. What we've seen over the past ten years is the IT being outsourced to the point that the people managing the systems are utterly clueless what they are doing. I'm not saying they are stupid and incompetent. I'm saying it is hundreds of times worse than you can possibly imagine.
Yet, things continue to get outsourced. It really is amazing.
There are conference calls involving tens of people that last multiple days, even weeks just to solve very simple issues that a competent sys admin and network person could resolve in a few hours assuming that they did not prevent the situation in the first place simply by practicing a few normal obvious practices in the first place.
The Big Corps are digging further and further into the hole. Its almost amusing to watch.
Here's what happened at Royal Bank of Scotland in 2012. They "made redundant" (aka fired) 1500 experienced locals and replaced them with 750 foreign contract workers.
Within a few months, the inexperienced contract workers screwed an update to the batch scheduling software (RBS, like most banks including HSBC, is an IBM mainframe shop). Then the same inexperienced workers screwed the recovery. It took almost a month to repair.
Wikipedia account of what happened https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
RBS bank's own account of what happened http://www.rbs.com/content/dam...
IMHO something similar will happen at HSBC. Get your money out NOW.
"Cock Up Your Beaver" does not mean what you think. This sig is intended to clog filters and annoy do-gooders
but you IT people are to stupid or brainwashed
serves you right no union no protection no job
No one wants to spend any money on training so they prefer to hire either clueless H1Bs who lie about their skill sets or young Red Bull-swilling MIS grads who claim they can learn any technology out of a book over a weekend.
Plus female CEO. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, in 25 years, I've seen much more cruelty, open crassness, and questionably legal antics from women managers than I ever have from men, especially late Boomer and X-er women who all seem to want to be the "Lean In" twit these days.
After checking BCBS of Michigan, I was unable to find Paula Steiner.
If you work for her, start a class action lawsuit. If she is on the board of your health insurance company, start a petition to have her removed. If HCSC is your insurer, switch companies and let them know why. Drop this person like a hot biscuit. Make sure that other CEOs understand that these tactics will result in legal trouble and their long-term unemployment.
I understand Trump as declared it a number of times.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
for those mid- to late-career technical folks, how have you managed to adjust to new realities like this?
Drive for Uber.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
I would like to walk through the house of everyone getting laid off to tally the "Made in ________" labels.
Blue Collar workers racing to the bottom brought us Walmart and then wondered where their blue collar jobs went.
You won't get much from steelworkers, manufacturing, mba's, etc.
Welcome to the global economy with rules the violate any clue of how to make a stable US economy.
Good news is there are a lot of other countries which have been bootstrapped.
I hate to say it, but I'm starting to think that give Trump a chance is the least of the sad choices we have.
The alternative is hopefully the end game from this
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/10/how-democrats-killed-their-populist-soul/504710/
You mean... cheaper labor results in cheaper goods and services? Huh, who would have thunk it. Capitalism sure is evil!
Might makes right irrelevant.
Why dont you fuckers form Unions? This shit is exactly why other trades formed unions. Follow the Electrician Union model and all of it will be fixed almost overnight.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Look - companies can and should be able to outsource their IT depts - particularly if the C level execs have no experience in IT.
quote:
It's been eight months since I left, no significant features committed to source control. We were doing major releases every month previously. They are thinking of bringing us back now but it is too late we've all moved on to better work. Company is losing millions a year by not having all of their refineries using this custom system that's been eight years in development. Tens of millions to re write from scratch. I've heard they are considering bringing us back but we have all moved on to better things now.
Solution:
Obviously don't go back. Particularly don't go back to your old jobs. That would be stupid.
Instead - a team of you fellow co-workers needs to get together. You all know the current system by heart; the backlog and the future of the product. Offer company to replace current outsourced company - with performance targets, bonuses, etc. (No you won't met the current price outsourced company X is offering - they wouldn't be interested if X wasn't doing the job correctly. Your target is higher and you expect (and demand) to get paid more.)
The cheap H1B's and "offshore resources" that you want us to train simply don't have the skill sets and experience required. Yes, I know their resumes are full of buzzwords and certifications, but not a single one of those folks that I've interviewed actually match what is in those works of fiction. And look at their work histories- 3 years out of school and you're a "Senior Technical Engineer"? Please...
I can run training sessions until I'm blue in the face and these folks are going to smile and say, yes, they understand. But when the server's down or there's a critical bug in the production code, you'll find out why they were so cheap.
build new computer systems. They can do trivial work around previous systems. To build computer system you have to know the business well.
Ordinarily, quitting a job can affect your eligibility for employment insurance, but quitting would not affect your eligibility for EI in these circumstances, and although quitting would lead to you not getting any severance, any severance package you *did* receive would only delay when you started receiving those benefits by whatever duration the size of your severance is equivalent to based on your normal rate of pay. The *ONLY* way that severance packages are worthwhile when you are going on EI is when you will find a job so quickly after losing the previous one that you wouldn't have even started to receive EI benefits in the first place.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
But we refuse to regulate anything anymore, we're too busy making accomodations for micro-aggressions and other nonsense, and greed is just absolutely out of control. What she is saying is blatantly and patently illegal. Sadly, it's unlkely anyone will notice or care. I hope they collectively sue the pants off of them.
This trend started in the 1990s and has only gathered steam. I positioned myself in an industry mostly immune to outsourcing (for now): local government.
There are enormous pressures on for-profit IT firms, whether it's hardware, software, or services. The requirement for increasing profit works against long term employment and high wages. Let's face it, IT has an issue with older workers. I am 52, but transitioned to local government about 15 years ago where they actually pay attention to age discrimination laws. Also, there is no profit motive (just a balanced budget motive), and you don't have to make sales for revenue. All of these things make for a more sustainable career, especially over 40. The combined pay/benefit/work-life balance is better than most for-profit companies. These jobs are a tiny oasis of stability. Stories like HCSC make me angry and there has been a steady stream of them the last few years. I hate to see the IT work force gutted by greed and multi-national trade agreements.
The jobs that would be moved to an outsourcer include monitoring and incident resolution, helpdesk support, and problem and patch management. Other areas would be partially outsourced, such as infrastructure product development, cloud and automation. HCSC will retain governance and planning. The outsourcing vendor has not been named, the employees said.
Who the hell does these kind of jobs in the US today? Those things have been automated or outsourced for the last 8-10 years. Who the hell banks on having a career on any of these fields? Monitoring? Helpdesk support? Patch management?
That was fine 15 years ago. And with the rise of DevOps and sophisticated virtualization/cloud infrastructure and automation, you truly do not need people in the US to do all the other things mentioned in the article.
That's like being surprised that Xmas decorations are manufactured in China and not in some town in the Rust Belt.
I'm not trying to be mean. People are going to be affected by this... but this aren't surprising news. It has been done for the last 8-10 years, and the transition has been mostly complete.
Keep your pulse on shit so that you do not get blindsided by paradigm shifts.
because those same baby boomers that are being laid off also voted to gut the government's regulatory powers in the name of freedom, small government and low taxes. That plus regulatory capture and a health dose of wedge issues to divide the working class means any attempt to address age discrimination will go precisely nowhere. BAU/Functioning as Designed.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
and the UK. And Australia. And any one of a number of first world countries. Hell, they're having trouble competing with _me_ because my pay and benefits suck.
I can't compete with the second world. I can't compete with a country like India with a massive and largely abandoned underclass and lax environmental laws (and we're not talkin' the feel good "save the whales" kind, we're talking the "no cancer villages" kind).
Competition is only beneficial when there's an even playing field and the rewards are something better than enough food and shelter to survive. Otherwise it's the same bullshit race to the bottom humanity as suffered for thousands of years.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
During the training of replacements, just let it slip that your data centers are all powered with rendered cow and pig fat. Just like the cartridges for British Enfields.
Have gnu, will travel.
(I'm an old fart too, so it's 'our' word)
Several years ago we were still in the Great Recession. Salaries were naturally depressed and the length of the recession depressed them further as a result of several years of increases well below the inflation rate.
I bet you can't get healthcare for the same cost as three years ago either. Do you fly to India for your twice-yearly dental cleanings too?
U.S. born engineers have been very successful and innovative. Foreign workers come from different educational backgrounds and experiences. As anyone who was worked besides them learns this gives them different attitudes and propensities. That make them counterfeits not plug-compatible with more experienced workers. When you factor in the costs of projects that eventually collapse or fail to gain traction with users, the ultimate cost of H1b Workers may be higher. Or if you are unwise... One of the many disastrous offshoring attempts may be very harmful to you own career.
"Knowing everything doesn't help..."
If you're in this industry and can't manage "work optional" by 45-50, you're doing it wrong. The answer is to GFTO before you get pushed out.
ERROR: Null
I originally submitted this last week, not because I'm afraid of my job now, but because I'm worried what the future holds for our jobs in general.
For me personally, I've been incredibly lucky to work at an IT services company that's basically let me choose assignments and gain tons of broad experience. If I want to learn a skill, I try to work on a project that needs it, or introduce it to one I'm working on. I'm 40 and it's tougher keeping up the fast pace of re-learning newer buzzwords for older technologies with a family, but I do it because the only other way to go is IT project management or middle management in general -- something I'd love to avoid if possible. Problem is, with people like the CEO of HCSC basically saying they're actively discriminating against experienced employees, how long will it be until every single US or European executive thinks the same way she does? I know the company I work for will dump US workers in a heartbeat if the MBAs get around to telling the executives to do so -- development is already mostly offshore.
I've been through numerous offshorings and reshorings -- the long game seems to favor timing the market -- bail when the offshoring starts, and find a company 180 degrees out of phase who is now reshoring a mess of an IT group. I worry that (a) there will be fewer companies not willing to put up with expensive garbage service providers, and (b) if they do, not having an entry level to the IT profession onshore will ensure that they're stuck with their providers. My earlier career is chock full of entry level jobs -- helpdesk, desktop support tech, extremely junior data center monkey, sysadmin, engineer, and finally where I am now. Each of those jobs gave me an opportunity to correctly learn the skills needed to move to the next level. If I didn't have that, where would I start? Extend that out to tons of new IT people -- they won't have the ability to grow and learn in a job their skillset can handle. Not everyone is a Red Bull-swilling JavaScript coder working 14 hour days at some startup -- there are tons of companies using IT systems to get real work done, and those companies need support even though they've been told they don't. When there are no entry level IT folks left, then the H-1B proponents will win because their argument will be true.
How to fix it? I say running a trade guild-style organization is the way to go. Have members buy Congress the same way businesses do -- it's naïve to think you can get something done in Congress without paying for it. At the same time, have apprenticeship-style training where new entrants actually learn core skills instead of glossing over things in some vendor certification course. I can't tell you how many very senior IT people I've met who just don't have the troubleshooting skills and ability to learn new stuff quickly...having some sort of career progression not managed by employers could fix that.
The cluelessness of the Slashdot community never ceases to amaze me.
Some years ago, the Slashdot crowd never stopped giving examples of ideological purity: they were for immigration, globalization, trade deals, political correctness, the whole thing. They were exquisitely progressive, not like those red-neck morons who were losers and racists and who couldn't understand sophisticated aspects such as globalization.
Every person who disagreed about this topic was answered by a crowd of self-righteous self-important know-it-alls giving lessons from the imaginary platform they thought they were standing on. They thought it would never be their turn. Now that you are biten by your own self-destructive ideology that only benefits the elite, how does it feel to be on your own? Enjoy the consequences of the ideas that you have supported so much. The word "useful idiot" comes to mind.
Once upon a time you coded so fine
Threw the outsourced red necks a dime in your prime, didn't you?
People call say 'beware troll, you're bound to fall'
You thought they were all kidding you
You used to laugh about
Every job that was exported out
Now you don't talk so loud
Now you don't seem so proud
About having to be doubting your next meal
How does it feel, how does it feel?
To be in risk of losing your job
Like a complete unknown, like a rolling stone
If some Indian IT consulting company offers services at bargain basement prices, they don't ask too many questions. To them, IT services are fungible.
It also gives them plausible deniability.
"Yes, health records are supposed to be protected. And we told our contractor just that. See? Here's the memo! So the fact that the health records for half-a-million people were released isn't our fault. We shouldn't have to pay a fine or anything because we told them they should be protected! I mean, what are we supposed to do, protect them ourselves? That'd be expensive! Dear God, won't somebody think of our profit margins?"
Huh. I admit, I never considered that angle. This may go some way to explaining the seemingly self-destructive behavior of CIO's who insist on hiring marginally competent Indian hackers.
Still... not quite convinced. I'm no legal expert, nor do I wish to be, but I do believe a company would be held responsible for whatever fuckups its contractors make. The data still belong to the company, and are its responsibility, after all.
Might makes right irrelevant.
That's what I hear when I read the CEO's statement. All those Gen X'ers waiting for management roles to open up from Boomers who have held them and refused to retire? Ya, once they retire, they'll be gone. And an endless parade of millennials who think they are entitled to senior positions, without putting in the effort to earn it.
It will be a lower tally than the number of red herrings in your post.
Right, because blue collar workers forced Wal-Mart to lobby for NAFTA and ruthlessly cut costs to increase their corporate profits.
Or something.
In order to balance the federal budget, medicare and medicaid have to be reeled in. Also, 20% of our GDP is going towards healthcare and every year insurance goes up. Obamacare was just a method of extending the scam just a little bit longer, and we're at the point either that sacred cow gets slaughtered or we deal with an economic collapse and a lot of really, spectacularly nasty shazbot.
Not surprised whatsoever that HCSC, being an outsourced IT Shop, wouldn't in turn outsource itself to India right before the blow up in order to maximize profits.
The real story here and the twist here is we've got an outsourcing company, outsourcing on top of its customer base. Usually companies outsource when they get into financial trouble or management wants to double-dip.
If you choose to buy things made in China when there is a made in America option, you are a part of the problem you lament if that problem is "why aren't things made here anymore" or "why aren't there jobs for making things here anymore".
I just retired after 42 years as a system programmer, the last 33 of them in the same company...now I get up around 10:30 or so and work on whatever hobby project I like....it's...nice. Very nice.
There is no God, and Dirac is his prophet.
There was a stock holders meeting where there was talk of "high cost geographies" and there is a push for "early career" hires. That is what a strong dollar will get you.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
I didn't take the first good paying job out of college that came my way. I turned it down and started a company while working part time at a low-wage gig instead. If you don't want job instability maybe you should have thought about that before going to work for a boss who can fire you at a moments notice.
I say let them in. We can compete. We just need to even the playing field. The problem for native workers is that we've closed the boarders and restricted immigration. It's not the other way around. H1B workers are forced to accept low wages relative to natives. Unlike a native they can't just quit and move on to the next job if the pay isn't competitive.
I'd rather live in a free society and deal with the competition than one regulated and taxing me to enslavement. We don't need the 100,000 or so government introduction programs (public schools) nor permission slips to drive (they act and are being used like internal passports stopping people from working via suspended drivers licenses for non-driving related 'offences' if they are unable to pay child support based on speculative 'potential' earning estimates, or a kid under a certain age, which is also discriminatory graffitis a wall).
If there is no violence, theft, fraud, or coercion there should be no crime. Joining the migration for the purpose of forming a free state is the only feasible solution today if you want to live in a free society: http://www.freestateproject.org/
I work for a state university, and we've started to see a similar trend. I our case, it's not profit motivated, it's who can we point the finger at. That way, when something goes wrong, it wasn't us who did it.
Then they talk about the fact that we have a SLA with the provider. Like by just having the SLA that guarantees something. Typically when I ask about the SLA, the terms are something like we don't have to pay for the service while it was down, or we can cancel the contract. Great, so we don't have to pay for something we weren't getting, and we can change to somebody else who'll make the same promise to provide the service.
The first question comes to mind, "Did you vote?" and "Who did you vote for?"
Some parties only support Large Corporations because they are to BIG to fail & Politicians/Policy Makers will sign the law that ships the jobs to other countries.
If I was in charge I would do the follow for job security:
1. Retrain employees for Linux
2. Migrate to Linux
3. Run a utilization software on the computers(PC/Laptops).
4. Let the lazy ones go
5. Let the hard headed that doesn't want to learn new technology go
6. Hire new college grads regardless of citizenship
Method #2:
1. Upgrade Microsoft + new forms of automation
2. Left them all go
3. Hire new college grads regardless of citizenship
Results:
Method #2 will cost more if calculated for long term even with newer forms of automation.
Boy, if I were in charge, I'd ship 99% of these H1B visa people BACK! Listen, I'm a conservative, believe in capitalism, but, THIS IS A LOAD OF CRAP! These companies using H1B visa's as a way to make more profit, at the expense of the American workers, SHOULD STOP!
FTA:
CEO Paula Steiner said, "As full-time retiring baby boomers move on to their next chapter, the makeup of our organization will consist more of young and non-traditional workers, such as part-time workers or contractors."
Openly admitting to age discrimination on paper by the CEO? Holy Wow!
We all know it is practiced far and wide, but to put it in writing is beyond stupid. . . and a great thing for any scientist, engineer, or computer expert who suffers from the age-ism treatment that we over 40 get. This will become a class action, which will hopefully be the clarion call to arms, and will produce a judgement that goes on the record – not a settlement – so that we can finally have a fair system age-wise.
Oh, who am I kidding? I can hope. Those in the class will get little, but if they are pissed-off enough to push this thing through, and not settle out-of-court, then the real purpose of a class action lawsuit will be realized – a deterrent to those who might do so in the future, or who have done it lately.
Why do you think the tech titans are pouring piles of cash into Hillary Clinton's campaign???
Go to YouTube and search for "hillary clinton india outsourcing"
Hint: Tech titans in silicon valley do not need Hillary to be elected in order to get abortions, do drugs, have gay relationships, equalize pay between men and women, or desegregate their workplaces; they've ALWAYS been able to do those things, and they do not back Hillary because they care so much about what she will do for YOU (if they cared for YOU they would not be working to de-employ YOU and push down your wages and benefits).
There are TRILLIONS of dollars on the line in this election in which globalists want Hillary and her TPP treaty, which is why Wall Street bankers and Silicon Valley will have poured about $2 BILLION dollars into the Hillary campaign (They gave Obama about $1 BILLION for his, and she and her staff bragged they would have twice Obama's war chest)
The gap between the richest and the poorest has grown the fastest in US history under Obama, second to when the Clintons were previously in the White House. By contrast, the Reagan era saw people in ALL economic categories rise. The Bushes, being political pablum, were in-between both in performance and on the timeline. The super-rich want to get even richer and they demand Clinton.
Keep being fools if you want to, but you are being played.
It is the rare employee in the US who has an employment contract. At best, you'll have an offer letter from when you were hired. Sure, there's an employee handbook, but numerous court cases have held that these do not generally rise to the level of a "contract" (no "meeting of minds", "offer and acceptance", etc.). You'll also have a bunch of paperwork when you hired on for things like "assignment of patent and intellectual property rights".
Employment, in the US, for the most part are "at-will" - either party can say "nope.. not going to do it any more" with no repercussions.
Unemployment is only slightly different if it's a "fired/laid off" or "quit" - a matter of a few weeks in eligibility.
The WARN act is the only thing that makes severance required and deals with things like "constructive dismissal".
There should be a system in place such that business leaders or politicians get awarded only long term benefits. Obviously, laying off a lot of people or stop investing in development gives a short term boost and savings but destroys the company or country in the long term. Unfortunately, today, the CEOs or presidents have not to pay for actions which hurt in the long term but are evaluated on short term profit. In this case, the morale in the IT part of that health care service provider will take a huge hit. It happened to many technology firms. As a customer there, I would be worried, whether my health information will be safe in the future. And its questionable whether they will ever be able to acquire really good new talent.
Is it possible to setup a Go Fund Me campaign that would match the severance offer they're getting to allow these workers to not train their replacement?
Let's say 500 x 100k -> $50,000,000. Sounds doable. I wouldn't want to be to sorry sucker that's left behind learning what 500 people were doing.
This!
Outsourcing IT isn't the problem, it's a symptom of a company that prefers to fluff short-term numbers to the risk of the entire organization. So while the way this played out stinks, *everyone's* job at the company is at risk. And most other employees will be laid off without this extended window of paycheck to "train" their replacement.
Moreover, what do you expect taking a job at a publicly traded company whose only job is to goose their stock price? Ditto for people who trip over each other to work at some fancy VC-backed company, which will drop everyone at first mention of being acquired. You're deliberately courting companies who make it very evident they don't value you. So what on earth would make you think the company would care if you even stick around?
I know this firsthand because we're *not* one of those companies. We're a private, God-fearing company in Chicago.. and what's frustrating is developers (YOU GUYS) choosing the higher paychecks these soulless corporations can afford over the short-term, but then complaining like this when the enviable happens. So if you're truly sick of this, find someplace that's serving a greater calling. Then you can leave this bullshit behind.
ps. We actually are hiring full stack developers (focus on front-end initially).. post resume in this thread if you're genuinely looking for something different
Maybe that came off a bit strong, but seriously, is the sort of place where only key employees know complete lockdown passwords the sort of place that is just going to outsource those positions and lose access? The sort of management that want to go all James Bond with a fluffy cat that way want to know those passwords themselves, or have it stored securely somewhere, in case their key employee gets hit by a bus or something.
If they are not the company is probably effectively going to be roadkill soon in many ways since if they are putting in deliberate points of failure in one place they probably have them in many.
What companies have been seriously punished for such breaches?
So they'll lay off their workers, after having them document and train foreigners. Retain a few staff, and contract out. Then claim they can't find anyone and hire H1B holders.
This is illegal, and since she said specifically she was discriminating against older workers, looks like there should be a class action lawsuit with potential jail time involved.
I am an older IT worker. I enjoy the work and want to stay at it as long as I can. So far, I've been lucky enough to pick and choose employers.
This type of restructuring of a work force has gone on for a long, long time. HCSC is only catching blowback because their CEO is willing to be transparent about it. It's nothing new and it's not ending anytime soon. Like it or not, we have to live with it and adapt to it.
I've always looked at myself as a merchant rather than an employee. I have a collection of skills to sell. My employer is a customer buying the application of those skills. In this model, it's on me to sell skills that are in demand. By spending a fair amount of time doing just that, I find that I continue to have great choices and options...age notwithstanding.
Will this model always work for me? Probably not. Which is why I'm socking money away now for the day it rains. But the approach has worked well for a long, long time. I'll ride it until it drops. After that, I'll probably be offering y'all a friendly greeting when you visit the local Walmart.
IT workers or any workers are a cost. Businesses are setup or legally required (see Delaware) to maximize profits for the shareholders and generally managers are paid by the quarter or year on bonuses.
So you put them together and you get the below situation.
1. The CEO is required to maximize value and will be given the largest bonus for short term maximization.
2. Workers are an expense. Outsourcing lowers short term costs.
3. The CEO will meet both his requirement to maximize short term value and personal bonus if he outsources.
4. Any damage done to brand, the company or the very survival of the company in the long term is not in the CEOs best interest.
5. So why would any CEO running a business in the US paid on short term value not do this to as many workers as possible?
The issue here is if CEOs are paid for short term results they will continue to do this as much as possible. Long term as many of you have pointed out this does not work well and generally costs a ton more when you calculate TCO. The real fix to this problem is simple but close to impossible to implement. Pay CEO bonuses on long term results. There are any number of ways to do this, but in the US everything is majority short term, so there is penchant for cutting corners in business that tend to hurt in the long term.
I can say this because I have worked as internal labor/management, contractor and managing outsourced labor. I have been in the meetings with managers and C-level people and 99% of the time cost is in the presentation and very methodically discussed. Quality LOL that is skipped right over and Security only when it could get them in legal or financial trouble. So when the company comes back 6-12 months later crying that their IT is going to hell I have had to say you get what you pay for. You want a cheap solution don't expect quality, security or responsiveness. You can outsource all those things for any number of reasons, but the cost is generally the same as doing it inside for companies larger than 1k persons. There are special areas that make more sense like infrastructure outsourcing, but you still need an engineer in operations for when it breaks at the OS level and you still need people doing 24/7 monitoring and you still need design etc.
So bottom line good IT costs money, but the system is set up to try to cut costs in ways that long term are not profitable. The downside of this is the disruption of people lives when CEOs follow the formula they are required to execute.
It is a bit more complicated then that, the H-1B fans are bi-partisan, but if you live in California's 49th District, there is something you can do about it.
Darrell Issa who is probably the biggest H-1B fan on the Republican side is in a tight re-election. He is the sponsor of the SKILLS Visa act which raised H-1b to 185K from the current 85K[1]. If you are upset about H-1B's, and you live in CA-49 - you can make it count by voting against Darrell Issa.
[1] https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/2131
Obviously, the CEO should have chosen her words a little more carefully, but this is standard business practice. There is not a single for-profit company out there that exists for the benefit of employees. The purpose of a company is to maximize profits and return peak value into the pockets of shareholders and reward top-level leadership (ie. CEO and other officers). Everyone else is expendable and in essence a liability because they are consuming revenue from the bottom line with salary, rising health care costs, and 401k contribution matching as examples. The above reason is why it so very important to *save* as much money as you can while you can before the ruthless company leadership crushes you!
There is no question that there is age discrimination in every sense of the word. IT is rampant...The idea is that if you are an American with so many years of IT experience you need to be shown the door as quickly as possible. Anybody in the middle of their career needs to think long and hard about the forces which will drive down wages in the coming years: automation, foreign outsourcing, and H1B Visas. These forces will multiply under a Hillary Presidency since she works for Wall Street and the large multinational corporations. Companies are turning to India, millennials, and other demographics to drive down wages...The non-expert who is young, dresses sharp, and is congenial has a much better chance of landing a position these days. Expertise is being replaced with heavy documentation, automation, templates, and management. They do not need the expert anymore. The IT profession is maturing past the need for an expert anything...They're going for collective experience with management phasing out the need for the high-priced SME.
Back when Sam Walton was still running Wal-Mart, he was happy to carry "Made in the USA" labels in his store - as long as they were the same price or less as Chinese imports. A nickle more, and you were out the door. You're also ignoring the fact that the poor - who now make up most of this country - don't have the luxury of choosing to buy the more expensive option. If going to Wal-Mart and buying clothing made in China means that all three of your kids can wear shoes without getting blisters, then you buy the damn shoes at Wal-Mart.
You're making great efforts to hop over capitalist mountain ranges to hysterically point fingers at a capitalist molehill. It's wrong, obnoxious and insulting.
Except you don't have to shop at Wal-Mart at all. If you are so poor that you can only afford shoes made in China from Wal-Mart, you can shop at Goodwill instead.
Fuck you! Boss!
I will not train my replacement who you're scaring up from Timbuk-fore to replace me at 1/10th of my American standard wages.