So I spent 30 years at IBM, from 1977 to 2007. I by luck of age and service got a pension. When I joined the IBM family, it was family oriented. It was a career. I survived the massive lay-offs in the early 90's. Worked my way up from Typewriter repair to middle management. The company went from 425,000 employees in the 80's to 300,000 in 1993. One year when I was in IBM Finance, they wrote off $80B, and borrowed money to pay the stock dividend. I remember seeing the Chairman John F. Akers a few minutes after a press briefing in 1991. He was ashen faced. Again I survived, found growing parts of IBM Global Services. I was lucky. Then in 1998, they started to become a Body Shop. Your manager was called a PDM (Personal Development Manager). You never met or saw this person. It made it easier to the PDM to fire or layoff people. In 2000 I moved to Sales. Got luck made a ton of money. IBM still paid for results. I retired at the end of 2007 and still have many IBM friends. But starting 5-6 years ago they started laying off even top performers. No reason other than "your number is up". What a shame. There is no loyalty anymore by either the company or the people. When I joined IBM in 1977 it was the 3rd largest company in the world. And now, they don't even make the Top 100. Go figure. Back in the day we worked day and night for the success of the company and our families. Now in most American companies you are just a number.

So I spent 30 years at IBM, from 1977 to 2007. I by luck of age and service got a pension. When I joined the IBM family, it was family oriented. It was a career. I survived the massive lay-offs in the early 90's. Worked my way up from Typewriter repair to middle management. The company went from 425,000 employees in the 80's to 300,000 in 1993. One year when I was in IBM Finance, they wrote off $80B, and borrowed money to pay the stock dividend. I remember seeing the Chairman John F. Akers a few minutes after a press briefing in 1991. He was ashen faced. Again I survived, found growing parts of IBM Global Services. I was lucky. Then in 1998, they started to become a Body Shop. Your manager was called a PDM (Personal Development Manager). You never met or saw this person. It made it easier to the PDM to fire or layoff people. In 2000 I moved to Sales. Got luck made a ton of money. IBM still paid for results. I retired at the end of 2007 and still have many IBM friends. But starting 5-6 years ago they started laying off even top performers. No reason other than "your number is up". What a shame. There is no loyalty anymore by either the company or the people. When I joined IBM in 1977 it was the 3rd largest company in the world. And now, they don't even make the Top 100. Go figure. Back in the day we worked day and night for the success of the company and our families. Now in most American companies you are just a number.

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