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Investor pressure for short-term results. The new companies are under the same cost-cutting pressure as the old companies. Investors are being promised that layoffs will continue. Shows up in questions asked in stock analyst calls: Morgan Stanley stock analyst pinned down HPE CFO on layoff savings. Goldman Sachs analyst pressed DXC CEO on offshoring percentage.

Moving to short-term employment.
1966: "...job security based on performance..." Hewlett-Packard Corporate Objectives

2017: "Millennials have a fundamentally different attitude to work... Job security is having the skills to be persistently employable, rather than keeping a long-term position." HPInc Sales Brochure - 2017  

Company needs are changing. New technologies and business models require different employee skills. Companies need to make room so that the next generation of employees can advance. Jobs are being moved to lower-cost countries. Increased use of contract employees. Many functions are simply no longer needed.

"...how do you keep up with this next generation of IT and how do you bring people into this company for whom it isn't something they have to learn, it is what they know." "...we need to return to a labor pyramid that really looks like a triangle where you have a lot of early career people who bring a lot of knowledge who you're training to move up through your organization, and then people fall out either from a performance perspective or whatever..." --Meg Whitman

DXC: "We are bringing more and more people in at lower levels of the organization." New center in New Orleans will work with local colleges "developing a next-generation IT workforce." --DXC to analysts

HPE: "110,000 people left this organization, and it was in some way is like the tide going out. You could see where there were real opportunities to improve... Decreasing the layers in our customer-facing organization... Reducing the number of markets that we operate in... shift roles from high cost countries to low cost countries." --Whitman

2. How to evaluate your career situation.

Use the HPAA's Career Checkup -- hard-earned advice from members on evaluating your career situation -- wherever you work.

4. Advice from alumni to those considering returning. 

Based on extensive online discussions and private communications with HPAA members:

- Returning may have long-term career consequences. It can postpone learning new skills or technology, starting over at another company, or changing careers. "You don't want to appear to be only employable by HP." "I could've spent that time working my way up in a new company."

- If you are approached about -- or apply for -- a direct or agency-contract position at an HP-related company, be very clear about your employment history. A recruiter or manager may not know about any formal or informal rehire restrictions -- or may be overly-confident about getting approval. Many report losing critical time and wasting valuable energy on discussions that ended abruptly without explanation. If you did not leave under a restructuring program, make that very clear."

- Working through an agency is very different from direct employment. For legal reasons, you are treated differently -- for example, not included in staff meetings or celebrations. People's attitude toward you is different. Easy to get into a situation where, due to what the agency is charging for your services, you are expected to work at a much higher level than you are being paid for. When comparing alternatives, be sure to factor in the reduced benefits.

- It is a different company now. The managers who supported you may no longer have political power or may have left. The current work environment can tend to reduce teamwork and freedom. And you can always be laid off again in the next cycle. "Do I value myself and my family so little that I'd be willing to put our fortunes back in that position a second time?"

5. Moving on.

Comments from alumni who have left:

- "Learn new technologies and remember HP as kind of like college -- it was fun while it lasted."

- "Making less but I now get to spend more of my time doing the part of the work that I love."

- "I wish I had recognized much earlier the futility of my job and what it was doing to me. On the way home after an exhausting day, I bought groceries. I realized that the young man bagging groceries at the store had done more for civilization that day than I had."

- "Found out I was grossly underpaid."

- "Now I work for a 200-employee company and can get decisions made same-day."

- "In retrospect being WFR'd was a blessing. It forced me to get out, rethink who I am and what is important. I certainly would not have started my own business without the shove."

- "I wish I would have known that I had greater skills at adapting to my life after HP, resilience in dealing with the transition, and competencies that were valued by others."

- You may find "the companionship you thought you'd miss, the dreams you thought you'd dropped, and the enthusiasm you thought you left back in your youth."

Comments to info@hpalumni.org will be kept in confidence.

If formerly a regular, direct U.S. employee of HP or HPE -- or are in the process of leaving -- join the HP Alumni Association. No charge, thanks to HPAA's Supporting Members.

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