IBM retools Global Services

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Complaints: At the start of the article:
The goal of the restructuring is to reduce bureaucracy, eliminating the need for a traditional pan-European management layer and creating small, more flexible teams that can work better across borders. Around the world, IBM plans to consolidate service work into fewer locations.

At the end of the article:
The areas that are expected to feel the brunt of layoffs are traditional "break-fix" computing services, an IBM insider said last month. The anticipated changes have already drawn protests by IBM workers in Germany and France, where IBM reported poor results last quarter.

"Reducing bureaucracy" always has a good ring to it. Doesn't actually say anything about what's happening and why.

Looking more closely, the first paragraph says the work is to be put into fewer places with fewer people.

The second paragraph says the services to be afflicted are break-fix computing services.

Put it together, and when something breaks, those who fix it are expected to be small teams moving significant distances ("work ... across borders") to resolve the problems.
Any idea why people involved might be complaining?

Why are they doing this? From the article:
Big Blue is pushing aggressively into high-end business consulting and outsourcing services, yet it's still tied to its traditional services business. It's [sic] restructuring efforts are designed to accelerate its move toward business consulting and away from traditional computing services.

So, they're still tied to break-fix services, from which they want to escape, but there are still many people and companies which require those services.

So they cut the ability of the company to provide the services that IBM would prefer to de-emphasize.

Why should they do that?
The most consistent reason is that people will become so disgusted with IBM's break-fix sercvices that they'll stop asking for them.

Aside from revenue losses, how many companies dissatisfied with IBM are going to look to them for something else?

Either there's something unclear in the article or there's something dumbfounding in IBM's plans.

Here I'm willing to give ZDNet the benefit of the doubt. The arrogance in IBM's apparent approach sounds just like that company.; Posted by: Anton Philidor Posted on: 05/05/05 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use