According to the reports, IBM is planning to lay off about 9,000 employees in the United States as a part of its corporate restructuring. The effects of the layoffs mainly affect the Cloud Classic division that includes IBM’s IaaS platform developed from its acquisition of SoftLayer in 2013. The company is reportedly moving jobs to India as much as it can, affecting positions in consulting, sales, corporate social responsibility, and even internal IT.
Although IBM has not yet officially announced the number of employees to be laid off, it is estimated that a quarter of the Cloud Classic employees will be affected. Furthermore, about 10 per cent of IBM’s overall cloud workers have also been laid off, as reported. These job cuts are consistent with IBM’s previous announced plan of “workforce rebalancing” which has been ongoing in the past few years.
However, for those employees who have not been laid off, IBM has enforced a very strict return to office policy. It is expected that by the end of April, all employees should be physically in an IBM office for at least three days a week. Some sources have reported that badge swipes are being tracked, and only medical exemptions are being allowed, and these are not encouraged by middle management.
IBM has laid off workers and restructured as other large tech companies have had to rethink their workforce approaches. The company has not yet commented on the layoffs, but sources close to the company say that more job cuts are possible as IBM moves operations and resources around the world.
