IBM

I have very mixed feelings about this company. I joined during the IT boom in the late '90s and worked in many roles such as developer, dev lead, project manager, product and solutions architect, lead architect, pre-sales, and client architect. Thus, I sampled quite a bit of what IBM has or had to offer.

There is a lot I have to thank the people who worked there for, the people on the ground, developing the company's products and solutions, as well as a handful of people in other roles. They shaped me into the engineer I've become.

When I joined, Lou Gerstner had just turned this sinking super tanker around and more or less saved IBM, so the atmosphere was very positive. Cash flow was great, props were fantastic (similar to startups today), and one could pretty much pick and choose to do whatever one wanted to do.

At that time, the company supported explorers and out-of-the-box thinkers, both monetarily and with strong encouragement from the management layers. If you did a good job, successful projects, or created some program (even internal ones) that solved real business problems (saved/earned money), you were rewarded with rich cash awards and/or stock. It was a very attractive place with a high concentration of talent.

The golden era ended shortly after the IT bubble burst. Sam Palmisano had taken over, and instead of just steering the tanker straight ahead in the direction Gerstner had left it, Sam decided that gutting the company and punching holes in the hull would be a better strategy. About 2005, most employees globally could feel their feet had become wet with murky water.

The outsourcing trend started to wash over the western world in earnest. Organic talent recruitment to IBM was replaced by mostly strategically non-complementary company acquisitions. Jobs, mostly in the U.S., were shipped to offshore centers, primarily to India. Price Waterhouse Coopers Consulting's "IT department" was bought, and outsourcing started dominating the entire IBM culture. Outsourcing IBM jobs as well as jobs of its customers (the PWCC influence changed that term to "clients," as IBM mistakenly thought it was PWC for a while). This was the start of the cancer that still continues to eat IBM from the inside.

The problem I have with IBM is what I experienced since 2005: a straight line to the sea bottom, with a bridge crew that has no idea whatsoever about navigation, innovation, technology, nor how you can make money from it. A stark contrast to how it started out.

Short summary of events since then, to give the reader some context to why IBM is where it is and to help visualize the trajectory this company has had for the last decade:

• Strategy is cost cutting: trim the fat.
• Strategy is cost cutting: Sell business units, printers, networking, desktops.
• Strategy is cost cutting: Trim all the perks, attractive employer status be damned!
• Strategy is cost cutting: Halt and then cancel bonuses, freeze salary increases, except for upper management.
• Strategy is cost cutting: Trim the muscles, mass exodus of the real talent.
• Tactic for a one-time stock value boost: Sell the laptop division.
• Strategy is cost cutting: Sell further business, servers, chip fabs, and R&D capabilities.
• Strategy is cost cutting: Trim the bones as well, force out the fan club / "lifers" as well.

Ginni, the current CEO of the company, was handed a sinking ship, so I gave her the benefit of the doubt. I waited a little over a year for her to get her footing, and when she finally emerged from her cave, it was unfortunately the exact same Palmisano playbook. That broke my heart and made me lose all faith in IBM, as it was then clear IBM had no future.

From what I've heard since, from the few former colleagues still clinging to the husk of what used to be IBM, it's still the same aimless floundering with brand reorgs, org. reorgs, and disconnected speak, same as the day I left.

For anyone thinking about joining IBM, please think hard. They'll paint a rosy picture; they're still good with lofty words, but don't take the words at face value.

If you are talented and want to grow, as an individual or in your technical field, put this company at the bottom of your stack of places you consider seeking employment. If all other options fail to pan out, then you have this left, and they're pretty much taking anyone today in certain departments. Negotiate hard to compensate for you not going to receive a raise later on. View the employment as contract work where the contract can be cancelled at any moment, as loyalty and "IBM family" notions died mid-2000. And be prepared to work hard. They still employ the Vitality Curve (google it!), also known as the cooperative culture poison.

Disclaimer: This review reflects my own experience at the company up until 2014. I have no first-hand knowledge of what has transpired at the company since. The review is based on what I perceived and is naturally a subjective piece in its entirety.

1. Replace the leadership team, starting with the CEO. Pick a new CEO from outside IBM and let that person staff at least 33% of the management team.

2. Define a company identity. IBM died at age 94. It's dead and gone. The company that today carries the same name is another company, and its employees would very much like to know what it stands for, why it exists, and what its vision is.

3. Decide on a singular, razor-sharp strategy that aligns with the identity. A strategy that isn't a new variation of the existing one (cost cutting). "Social, Mobile, BigData, Analytics, Smarter Cities" aren't strategies; they're segments!

4. Visit some startups and see what's happening in the real world, outside the desolate IBM HQ buildings.

5. Have lunch with the leaders in today's IT industry (Google, Netflix, Uber, and the like) and hear what drives their leadership and workforce. Try to understand how those ideas differ from yours.