IBM reviews

Even though I am aware that DCCE is a cost-center, the IBM management board pressure on low salaries and expenditures here, had significant negative impact on a work climate at Brno site. Colleagues demotivation just grown over the years and couple of benefits just declined as well. Motivating in such conditions is very difficult. Other companies just see us as a 'open marketplace' to pickup any specialist they wish, as it will cost them only +20 - 50% of actual IBMer salary to get his/her interest and this will be still somewhere about the average salary for the job. It seems that due to vast amount of management levels, structures and policies IBM DCCE lost its possibility to evaluate/appreciate individuals and measure the success only by short term profit generated and completely forget about intellectual investment into its employees. Here I mean mostly work-life balance, respecting actual workload limits of individuals and personal interests. It all starts with choosing just 'paper good' candidates on critical positions and expecting experienced colleagues will fill the knowledge or motivation gap. In reality this will ends in frustration and burn-out stories or fluctuation of very skilled employees.

Subject Matter Experts retire, leave the business for greener pastures, are RA'd (Resource Action, permanently laid off), or die at their desks, their work load heaped upon those left with little or no training, documentation or resources. The 40 hour work week does not exist. Sixty to eighty hour work weeks with 3 hours of sleep between shifts is not unheard of. Peers lob hot potato and hand grenade work orders to you with little or no guidance and run, leaving you with no way to get the job done in the required time frame. No funding available to upgrade internal processes to the levels sold to the customer. No funding for anything. Abusive employee ranking system (PBC) never reflects the quality of your work, just the required bell curve. Good work not rewarded with pay raises. If I had a golden parachute I'd jump now and pull the ripcord.