A couple of weeks ago, there was a rumor floating around that IBM would be laying off a bunch of people. This was rather surprising, since our fourth quarter, and 2008 results were good; but like a lot of businesses, IBM is being cautious and proactive in saving money. The (first?) axe hit last week and almost 10% of my lab was let go (at least that’s what I hear). Luckily, I wasn’t one of them.

There have been a lot of watercooler talk, as can be expected. And a lot of times a link to Alliance@IBM has come up. I had never heard their site before, but it looks like a site which is pushing to unionize IBM employees. There’s a specific forum dedicated to job cuts and you can read the angry comments from people who were let go. I can only think of this as a bad thing for people who aren’t affected. The comments are skewed because everyone brings out their good points and questions why IBM is firing them, which doesn’t present an accurate view of why they were let go. For still current employees to read this, it raises a lot of FUD. No wonder there are rumors that the site is blocked in several IBM locations around the world.

Posted by Kevin in Blogs Tags: IBM, recession, working