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IBM Promises To Hire 25,000 Americans As Tech Executives Set To Meet Trump (reuters.com)

IBM Chief Executive Ginni Rometty has pledged to "hire about 25,000 professionals in the next four years in the United States" as she and other technology executives prepared to meet with President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday. Reuters reports: IBM had nearly 378,000 employees at the end of 2015, according to the company's annual report. While the firm does not break out staff numbers by country, a review of government filings suggests IBM's U.S. workforce declined in each of the five years through 2015. When asked why IBM planned to increase its U.S. workforce after those job cuts, company spokesman Ian Colley said in an email that Rometty had laid out the reasons in her USA Today piece. Her article did not acknowledge that IBM had cut its U.S. workforce, although it called on Congress to quickly update the Perkins Career and Technical Education Act that governs federal support for vocational education. "We are hiring because the nature of work is evolving," she said. "As industries from manufacturing to agriculture are reshaped by data science and cloud computing, jobs are being created that demand new skills -- which in turn requires new approaches to education, training and recruiting." She said IBM intended to invest $1 billion in the training and development of U.S. employees over the next four years. Pratt declined to say if that represented an increase over spending in the prior four years.

38 of 244 comments (clear)

  1. How's Ginny going to gt 25K green cards that fast? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I suppose they'd have to let go of 50K already here first as well.

  2. That is great... by 110010001000 · · Score: 2

    ...but I am unprofessional, so I guess I ain't getting a job at IBM.

    1. Re: That is great... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      After working with IBM Global Services for thirteen years, I think being unprofessional is a requirement.

  3. Translation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    They'll buy 50 companies with an average of 1000 US workers each, then lay half of them off.

  4. I'm highly skeptical by NothingWasAvailable · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The leopard doesn't change it's spots.

    IBM's principle strategy for the past decade has been moving work to lower cost countries (layoffs), stock buybacks, and acquiring other companies; these lower costs, increase earnings per share, and starve R&D of funding.

    1. Re:I'm highly skeptical by rtb61 · · Score: 2

      Not matter what the leopard chooses, if the meal is not accessible it will starve and in this case the simple government expedient of forcing all government funded contracts to be carried out by US citizens within the US, will force companies to comply, whether they want to or not. Sure some will bitch, the insanely greedy but the rest will accept it as long as it is an equal playing field (in the end they will be economically better off, ignoring insane short term destructive psychopathic greed).

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
    2. Re:I'm highly skeptical by Serge_Tomiko · · Score: 3, Funny

      The purpose of the Trump presidency is to oversee the end of USD Hegemony and the transition to a UN mediated reserve currency for foreign exchange.

      The USD has been artificially strong since the Nixon Shock, the reasons of which are significant but not relevant to my point. This was a political move, at that time. The goals of USD imperialism have been achieved, and the imbalances caused by this system (see the the Triffin Paradox) mean it is in everyone's interest to move to this system.

      An immediate consequence is the "lower cost" countries will no longer be so much lower as the USD falls in value and other country's currencies rise.

      The same is true for imported goods. Many sneer at Trump's proposal to bring manufacturing back. Automation definitely means this won't be a huge solution to unemployment, but it's necessary. Cheap goods from China will no longer be affordable for the lower classes. Even if all new factories were entirely automated, we would still need to build them.

    3. Re:I'm highly skeptical by CaptainDork · · Score: 2

      The R&D starvation is pandemic in the US.

      CEOs and shareholders are shortsighted greedy bastards or bitches, as applies.

      --
      It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
    4. Re:I'm highly skeptical by whoever57 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The purpose of the Trump presidency is to oversee the end of USD Hegemony and the transition to a UN mediated reserve currency for foreign exchange.

      Hah, hah, very funny conspiracy theory you have there.

      In reality, it's much simpler, and far more obvious. The purpose of the Trump presidency is to enrich Donald Trump.

      --
      The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
    5. Re:I'm highly skeptical by gtall · · Score: 5, Insightful

      "forcing all government funded contracts to be carried out by US citizens within the US, will force companies to comply"

      Nope. You forget companies are adept at gaming a system, any system. They have legions of lawyers to figure out how to do that and they can pay much more than the hired guns for the U.S. government. And the U.S. spends roughly $4 Trillion out of a $19 Trillion economy, but most of that is cash payments and stuff that could only funded within the U.S. regardless of what is offered in foreign countries.

      What's likely to happen is that Trump does his Monkey Dance on Twitter complaining about some perceived inequality. Companies will make treks to Trump Tower where Trump will receive them. Trump will make some grand pronouncement of a deal that only he could make. Companies will laugh all the way home on how they took that rube to the cleaners. Everybody is happy.

    6. Re:I'm highly skeptical by gtall · · Score: 2

      Wait until Trump wastes U.S. R&D. He won't understand its function and no one will be able to explain it to someone who has the attention span of gnat.

    7. Re:I'm highly skeptical by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      The reason the U.S. dollar is THE reserve currency is because our military and "trade treaties" are deliberately tasked to promptly squash any and all pretenders to the crown.
      No one really trusts the U.S. dollar any more, but there's little alternative at the moment. We took out Hussein and Gaddafi because they made too much noise about limiting the destructive influence and systematic theft of the petrodollar mechanism. Others will meet the same fate.
      Our Q.E. program alone is proof we can't really be trusted, and we have the gall to bitch about Chinese "currency manipulation". :)

    8. Re:I'm highly skeptical by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      > In reality, it's much simpler, and far more obvious. The purpose of the Trump presidency is to enrich Donald Trump.

      I disagree. I think the the purpose of a Trump presidency is

      (a) For Trump to try to fill that hole in his heart created by an unloving and disapproving father - the man is a walking needball craving approval and adoration, right now he's doing a god damn victory tour, who does that? All the generals he's filling the cabinet with are father-surrogates he imprinted on while in a military boarding school.

      (b) For Bannon to tear down the institutions of government (as evidence for this I point to all of the cabinet appointments of either incompetents like Carson or those outright hostile to the very mission of the departments they will head, like EPA, Energy, Labor and Justice).

    9. Re:I'm highly skeptical by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      > now he's doing a god damn victory tour, who does that?

      Hitler. Literally. The last time someone held post-election political rallies was 1930 germany.

      Fortunately, Trump's rallies seem be kind of anemic. Like the one in Fayetteville, NC Or the one in Iowa where he got less than 5,000 people and had to use the smaller Hy-vee convention hall instead of the adjoining wells-fargo arena.

  5. There's always a catch by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Heard it before - they tout how many new hires they've brought in over the years. What they don't say is they do it through letting older, higher-salaried employees go. If you lay off one engineer that's been with the company 20+ years and making $120k, it's easy to hire one or two new college grads making $50k. I'd estimate the 25k new hires will be at the expense of 10k-12k experienced engineers.

    I was lucky - I left IBM five years ago and six months before my entire team was moved offshore. A part of me still has fond memories of IBM, but it's heartbreaking to hear all the stories of really good, experienced engineers that have received top ratings year after year suddenly get a low rating with no explanation and let go two months later. It's happened quite a bit, and it's sad.

    There used to be a movement to get a union going at IBM (Alliance@IBM), and on its website you could read a number of stories off the layoffs for younger or offshore replacements, but IBM eventually got to them and they folded.

    1. Re:There's always a catch by CaptainDork · · Score: 5, Funny

      The answer is blowing in the wind. ~ Bob Dylan

      I was a suit at Mobil Oil in the IT department.

      They kicked us all out and hired "contract" people.

      The people in Dallas walked across the street to Kodak.

      I got an email from my replacement(s) asking me questions like the password for this and that and asking how the spaghetti code tied the mainframe into the local area networks tying Beaumont, Dallas, and Reston together via a T1 with Unix boxes (ca. 1996).

      I had the complete list of email addresses at the time and I replied with .cc to the big players, including Fairfax, that, "Mobil Oil has made certain business "rightsizing" decisions and I fully support the corporation's new direction and we should all begin, immediately, to trust the expertise of the "best of breed" new players that were selected to work within the new paradigm."

      I got some calls from my former managers and had lots of fun with that.

      I found a new job in four days.

      --
      It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
    2. Re:There's always a catch by shanen · · Score: 2

      You must still be working to choose AC status? Afraid of the retribution?

      I spent much of my career in various parts of the Big Blue machine, and it was sad to watch the devolution. I still think "respect for the individual, customer service, and quality" were good principles to build a company on. Last I heard the buzzword was something like "cognitive solutions in the cloud", though that didn't get much mention in the CEO's post-election fawning letter. (I actually interpreted the primary objective as a warning to current employees to shut up about the Donald.)

      Anyway, seems clear to me that IBM is in another transition. As noted in the first comment, promising to hire 25,000 people doesn't mean much if you fire 26,000 during that same period. IBM used to be a career employer, but the new model is completely different. They hired 70,000 last year without growing the company. When you do the math, that translates into "excess attrition" around 50,000, but I think it's a new steady state. A few people will have long careers, but most will be in and out as needed or not. Last I heard, the IBM lingo for that approach is onboarding and offboarding. They will actually hire a fair number of new graduates, but try to get rid of most of them within a few years, and most of the actual project work for the actual customers will be handled by short-term contractors. (I predict the main beneficiaries will actually be the Chinese, but I better not say why and how... Then I would need the AC status.)

      --
      Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
  6. 25,000 Americans as Tech Executives by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Will Trump have time to meet with every one of them? That's a lot of executives!

  7. Meaningless figures by ranton · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Your comment seems half in jest, but then again so must IBM's statement be. Saying they will hire 25k professionals over 4 years is meaningless. They didn't say they will have a 25k net greater number of US professionals, just that they will hire 25k people over 4 years. With 84k US employees today (roughly), it would only take a 7.5% yearly turnover for them to hit that target with no net job increases at all. The only extra bit of information is that they intend their US workforce to be greater in 2020 than it is today, which would be true even if they only gain a few dozen jobs.

    This type of PR drivel is only possible in a country with math education so poor there is a market for tip calculators.

    --
    -- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
    1. Re:Meaningless figures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Quality of math ability has nothing to do with mis understanding IBM statement. The text has so many loopholes and incomplete ideas, its possible for the lay person to think one thing when reality a completely different outcome is also possible with both being true. I dont know how many people IBM hire in a single year, but from what i have seen they often hire lots of contractors for each and every project. With that in mind 25000 new names over 4 years might not be all that different from the same number of contractors they had over the past few years.

      As always, the real problem is that people dont realise that these announcements are written in a way to deceive from the outset, maths has nothing to do with any thing.

    2. Re:Meaningless figures by ranton · · Score: 3, Interesting

      As always, the real problem is that people don't realize that these announcements are written in a way to deceive from the outset, maths has nothing to do with any thing.

      I admittedly was lumping concepts like logical reasoning and number sense into the field of mathematics when I made my comment. But that certainly wasn't clear when I used an example of simple computation to criticize math skills. IMO, the worst part of having poor math skills is not the inability to compute numbers, but the inability to identify flawed reasoning especially when numbers are involved. A personal pet peeve of mine is when someone says they were good at math in school except for word problems, which only shows they were quite poor at math but could at least do some simple computation.

      --
      -- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
    3. Re:Meaningless figures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      You mean you actually pay for a tip calculator??

      How much did you add in as a gratuity?

      Vexing questions indeed!

    4. Re:Meaningless figures by geekmux · · Score: 2

      Your comment seems half in jest, but then again so must IBM's statement be. Saying they will hire 25k professionals over 4 years is meaningless. They didn't say they will have a 25k net greater number of US professionals, just that they will hire 25k people over 4 years. With 84k US employees today (roughly), it would only take a 7.5% yearly turnover for them to hit that target with no net job increases at all. The only extra bit of information is that they intend their US workforce to be greater in 2020 than it is today, which would be true even if they only gain a few dozen jobs.

      This type of PR drivel is only possible in a country with math education so poor there is a market for tip calculators.

      This isn't math. It's bullshit jargon written in legalese.

  8. Re: Trumping Obama by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    It's even more interesting that Obama saved millions of jobs during his time in office and Trump could only save 700 out of 3000 jobs that went to Mexico.

  9. Bullshit Reporting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    When is all that talk about fake news supposed to go into effect? Hiring '25K people in the USA' is in no way equivalent to hiring '25K Americans' and in no way excludes hiring H1-Bs nor excludes contracting to a contracting firm and claiming you've hired everybody at the firm (that's often a selling point: Our firm has 9K years worth of graduate experience behind it). It also makes no mention on the amount of people you're going to fire (but at least the summary does make a note of that). Hire 25K, fire 30K, retire 7K?

    Since the knowingly immoral interpenetration of the quotes was directly used to create the blatantly false headline, does that categorize this story as fake news? And people wonder why the trust in journalism has been near completely eroded.

    1. Re:Bullshit Reporting by serviscope_minor · · Score: 2

      Seriously why do so make people here have trouble with basic English words like "fake" and "news". It's almost like you don't want to understand. Let me break it down for you.

      The claim is IBM made a pledge. Is this new infrmation? Yes. That makes it news.

      Did IBM in fact make the pledge? Yes. Therefore the news is real, a.k.a. not fake.

      Is IBM telling porkies and/or weaselling? Who knows. Quite possibly, but that does not make the news that IBM made a pledge fake.

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
  10. Incorrect headline by kimvette · · Score: 5, Informative

    The actual quote:

    "We have thousands of open positions at any given moment, and we intend to hire about 25,000 professionals in the next four years in the United States," Rometty wrote in a USA Today piece published on Tuesday afternoon.

    Ginni Rometty did not indicate that IBM would hire Americans. They would hire " 25,000 professionals in the next four years in the United States" - and Ginni did not specify "additional." For all we know they could be laying off 25K Americans and be bringing in 25K H1-B and L-1 workers to replace them.

    Next paragraph:

    IBM spokesman Adam Pratt declined to say how that hiring might be offset by staff reductions or disclose how many people IBM employs in the United States.

    See? It is nothing but DoublePlusGood DoubleSpeak.

    --
    The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
  11. oh fuck you, IBM by stinky+wizzleteats · · Score: 2

    I was stealth laid off by IBM (merger, contract release) along with a couple hundred of my friends in August. Your axe is bloodier than most, IBM.

  12. Re:Trump hasn't divested his buinesses by buss_error · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Most EC votes are bound, EG: They must vote the way they are told.

    That said, those that voted for President Elect Trump knew exactly what they were voting for - and that's what they want. While I question the wisdom of their vote, I don't question they were simply uninformed of the consequences. My only worry is that Mr. Trump will turn out exactly as bad, or worse, than I expect. Just as Mr. Trump is president of the whole country, so am I bound to the consequences of the votes of those I vehemently disagree with. My only little ray of hope is that I'm mistaken, and those I disagree with were right.

    But I don't think that's going to be the case.

    --
    Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
  13. Re:History is set to repeat. by khallow · · Score: 2

    Just because Trump is a venal populist, doesn't make him Hitler. Hitler pulled a lot of crazy shit even before he took over: an attempted coup of Bavaria and a rigged trial for treason that ended in a handslap, years of riots and street violence that often killed people, being an unwitting but effective party in the overthrow of the Free State of Prussia, and of course, being in the massively dysfunctional state of the Wiemar Republic.

  14. Re: Trump hasn't divested his buinesses by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Most EC votes are bound, EG: They must vote the way they are told.

    Depends, in some states, if you read the laws, they can be punished after, but the vote remains valid.

    More importantly, in 21 states there are no laws, and that is more than enough to swing this election.

    That said, those that voted for President Elect Trump knew exactly what they were voting for - and that's what they want. While I question the wisdom of their vote, I don't question they were simply uninformed of the consequences.

    I do question their information. Lots of folks didn't realize a thing about Trump, and only gave a superficial examination. Even worse, I've seen people claim that they didn't care what happened, they just hoped he broke the system.

    Just as Mr. Trump is president of the whole country, so am I bound to the consequences of the votes of those I vehemently disagree with.

    Nope. You are bound to the limits of your conscience. My state makes that express in its constitution, and thereby ascribes the role of ultimate arbiter to the people in their individual persons, but it is true in those others that don't say it.

  15. Re:No worries! by shanen · · Score: 2

    Actually IBM used to be one of the nice companies, and they are still milking that reputation as hard as they can. However, being nice almost broke the company and they have come around to the evil side these years.

    Being an evil company doesn't guarantee profits, but being a nice company guarantees failure. I think the best examples are NetScape, Palm, Sun, and Nokia. I'm still trying to decide whether Toshiba and Motorola deserve to make that list. Not sure if Toshiba is toast yet, and not sure if Motorola ever deserved to be called nice.

    --
    Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
  16. Re:overmatched by drinkypoo · · Score: 2

    First Carrier and now IBM are treating Trump like a prostitute treats a john. Appeal to his ego while giving him absolutely nothing, just so Trump can tell his followers that he knocked off a piece and she was begging for it.

    There is no prostitution going on here, only theater. (While the historical connection between prostitution and theater is well-documented, it is not highly relevant here.) Trump doesn't need actual victories, he only needs apparent victories.

    --
    "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  17. Re: Trumping Obama by drinkypoo · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It's even more interesting that Obama saved millions of jobs during his time in office

    Obama didn't save any jobs. Jobs have been replaced with lower-paying jobs.

    --
    "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  18. Not necessarily by PortHaven · · Score: 2

    What this likely means...

    Is that when the churn occurs, they will hire Americans instead of H1B visas. But there is a reason for this. Many government agencies are applying pressure on contractor firms to no longer use H1B visa holders. And that the awards of future contracts may in part be based on those who have the higher percentage of U.S. citizens and permanent residents.

    So essentially, they could be saying "We have 25,000 government contracting positions for which we are being told that employing H1B visa holders can jeopardize the awarding of contracts. So for these contracts, when an employee leaves, we will replace them with U.S. workers."

    1. Re:Not necessarily by ranton · · Score: 2

      So essentially, they could be saying "We have 25,000 government contracting positions for which we are being told that employing H1B visa holders can jeopardize the awarding of contracts. So for these contracts, when an employee leaves, we will replace them with U.S. workers."

      She could be saying that, but considering her careful wording it is quite doubtful. The language of her actual article includes the same language CEO's are using to justify H1B labor today. This includes stating we need new skills for the new economy (with the implication her current and former employees couldn't have been retrained) and that the US government needs to redouble efforts to train more future employees (or else IBM will need to continue hiring H1B holders).

      Obviously you cannot know for certain what IBM will do based on a self-serving and cryptic newspaper article, but based on IBM's history no reasonable person could conclude any changes are coming from them. Not based on these statements anyway.

      --
      -- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
  19. Re:No worries! by unixisc · · Score: 2

    The one when they had a pension fund for their employees, and would go out of their way to give them world class care. That probably ended after the 80s, when they started hemorrhaging cash

  20. Re: mod parent down by coteriescavenger · · Score: 2

    This is why Trump got elected, because ordinary Americans are tired of being called racist misogynists for no reason by idiotic SJWs. You think calling us racist more is going to help? Enjoy your new president, we picked him just for you :)

    This is also the reason why slashdot is among the few places on the internet where people never learned that Trump had a real chance of winning, why he was winning, and especially why he should win. The modding system allows for a walled garden of ideas type of experience here.