IBM tells thousands of remote employees to come back to office or find new jobs
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While selling benefits of “telework” to others, IBM forces relocation in stealth layoff.
Sean Gallagher
IBM, one of the earliest companies to embrace the concept of employees working en masse
from home or small satellite offices, has informed thousands of
employees that it's time to return to the mothership—or find a new job.
As TheWall Street Journal reports,
this week is the deadline for remote employees—who make up as much as
40 percent of IBM's workforce—to decide whether to move or leave.
IBM once heralded the savings and productivity gains it won from its "Mobility Initiative."
The company has also made untold millions over the past two decades
selling software and consulting services, such as its Sametime instant
messaging and voice products, to companies looking to support far-flung
workforces.
Earlier this month, IBM touted research from IBM's Smarter Workforce Institute
that found "remote workers... were highly engaged, more likely to
consider their workplaces as innovative, happier about their job
prospects and less stressed than their more traditional, office-bound
colleagues."
But even as IBM was selling the magic of remote workforces to its
customers, the company was dismantling its own "telework" program. In
February, IBM CEO Ginny Rometty began rolling back remote working,
starting with the company's marketers. IBM's chief marketing officer,
Michelle Peluso, announced in early February that her division's
employees would have to relocate to one of six "strategic" marketing
office locations around the US (Austin, New York City, Atlanta, San
Francisco, Cambridge, and Raleigh) or leave the company. That policy has
been rolled out over the past three months to other divisions of IBM.
Now, the company has issued a final ultimatum: employees either need
to "co-locate" with members of their team, apply for a different job
within IBM closer to home, or leave the company. The move is similar to
one Marissa Mayer made at Yahoo in 2013—a stealth layoff driven
by dire economic circumstances. IBM is facing similar financial
challenges as the company's revenues continue to fall, and the policy
move is essentially a way of laying off thousands of employees who can't
afford on their current IBM salaries to move to a major metropolitan
area like New York.
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