IBM: Fumbling In The Extreme?

Following up on the cultural or cult like theme in Boeing: Business As Usual? 

This is what happens when one attempts to commoditize information technology, infrastructure, support, engineering and coding for critical systems.  Said "culture" includes national security and major industry, by outsourcing to labor at the margin. viz. H1B visa imports, onshore coding houses or overseas so called centers of "excellence". 

At the core? A low cost at all costs culture, at its finest.  This short sighted, perverse culture and mindset is more concerned with cost, schedule, profit and bonus. Separate design from manufacturing? Divorce engineering from R and D? Offshore and outsource? We can save millions? Sounds smashing. There are no coincidences, you get what you pay for and you can pay me now, or pay later...

Corollary to the aforementioned corporate mindset and Grand Poobah cult-ure... Bright horizons or orisons at IBM? The beginning of the end for IBM was the crash of Delta Air Lines Flight 191 at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport on August 2, 1985.  

Said event resulted in Don Estridge's unfortunate and premature death at 48 years of age, which precipitated ESD (Entry Systems Division - where the PC was incubated) being reabsorbed back into the "Armonkian" monolith.  Thereafter, with the subsequent loss of creative independence, it was all downhill for Big Blue.  Fast forward 35 years...

Rometty became an exemplar of the dysfunction in executive compensation in U.S. industry... there has never been any mystery why Rometty’s pay, like that of other CEOs of major corporations, remains buoyant in good times and bad: It’s cultural. - LA Times

Since that fateful day in 1985, Rometty is just another in a long string of CEO's and a not so exclusive club of E-suite - board room denizens who have been compensated in the extreme?

...In 2019, eight of the 11 board members (not counting Rometty herself) were themselves current or former CEOs of major corporations, as were three of the four members of the board’s compensation committee. - LA Times

Clear eyes for the details indeed, eight years of highlights include... 

22 straight quarters of declining revenue, negative yoy revenue growth in 2015, 2016, 2017, and a flat stock price or dead money over her tenure. All for the paltry price of an estimated $137 million + 2019 compensation and exit package TBD, such a bargain? It's a mindset, it's a culture?

...they were distinguished representatives of America’s CEO culture, which turns a blind eye to performance that warrants a pay cut, not to mention a firing. When performance stalls or declines, they often find a silver lining, citing “progress” toward a distant goal. - LA Times

The Nattering One muses... Sound vaguely familiar? In the end, do these more oft than not under performing and skinflint corporate turncoats get what they so richly deserve? viz being penny wise and pound foolish the only thing they do manage well? 

People, whether they’re inept or highly skilled, are often caught in a bubble of inaccurate self-perception. - Amazing Incompetence?

Alex, what is The Peter Principle? Adjunct, to collect huge compensation while collectively fumbling the future away viz IBM, Xerox, HP, Olivetti, GM, GE and now Boeing come to mind, we could go on but I digress...

Unfortunately, the real killers or cult leaders can be found running free range on the back nine viz rarely if ever are any of the E-suite, their blue blood board room lackeys or country club upper management minions held accountable. 

Illusory superiority or bias, keeps one from knowing when they are out of their element.  - Man's Got To Know His Limitations?

Exorbitant salaries, bonuses and stock options are collected and at the first sign the gig is up, the "cult-ure" members move on to set up a new board room buffet at the expense of their next unfortunate victims.  As always, the smaller fish in the food chain are left behind to bear all the suffering, professional and economic. Cult-ure? Cults?

The Chief Executive Leadership Institute, a non-profit “school for CEOs featuring applied research and peer-driven learning” that generates a multi-million dollar revenue stream for the Yale School of Management. There is no structural difference between the “conspiracy theories” of Zero Hedge and the “serious opinions” of Chief Executive. The only difference is whether the constructed narrative supports the status quo or challenges the status quo. - Ben Hunt

Coming full circle... Company vision? Mission statement? Core values? Brand? Mindset? Culture? Cult? Somehow this not exclusively felinus behavior comes to mind...  

This is a reflection of the "types" of people that are considered a "fit" within today’s corporate culture... - The Architects Of Their Own Demise?

It's out there in the open and you just can't hide it?  These so called "cultured" people who proudly tout their corporate "culture", most would not know a culture even if it hit them square in the face along with the petri dish. Why?

It's a pernicious, pervasive and perverse mind set and "cult-ure", which is reflected in our institutions private and public through educational, government, corporate and monetary policy devoid of wisdom, insight and common sense.  Why?

Trebek queries, individuals collectively driven and misled in their lifelong journey and search by false prophets for false profits form this.  Alex what is a...

Cult - noun - a misplaced or excessive admiration for a particular person or thing; a person or thing that is popular or fashionable, especially among a particular section of society.  A system of religious veneration and devotion directed toward a particular figure or object.

Hence, our favorite lex parsimoniae, Occam's Razor or Rule Number One - Never forget what it's "all about" Alfie.... all lies lead to the truth, to find motive or truth, always follow the money.  No joke and all attempts at philosophy or humor aside... 

the immediate gratification and greed which is begat by this cannibalistic "cult-ure" and its acolytes puts national security, safety, quality, the public interest in setting a living wage and regulating employment, potential cost in lives and our national future, seated in the back of and more often than not, under the bus.  

This state of affairs is amply demonstrated by the global plague of stupidity, cognitive dissonance and ignorance we suffer.  Worry not, standard SOB, business as usual, stiff upper lip, be calm and carry on as the f*ck ups, fiascoes, scandals, cover ups, broad daylight highway robbery, insane bipartisan political ass clown posse - circus, moral atrocities and public beatings shall continue until morale improves.  And now this...

Our three favorite rejoinders:

Stupid is as stupid does - Forrest Gump; 

You can't fix stupid, no pill for it, it's fo'ever - Ron White ; 

There are idiots, look around - Larry Summers ;

And Now - The Gift... To avoid the pernicious global plague of stupidity, drink the Kool-Aid and become one of the innoculati. 

The Kool-Aid is available at [VIRUS REMOVED BY ECHELON UNDER ORDER OF PATRIOT ACT II ... transmission terminated]

Taking a deep post rant breath... that makes nCov19 or Coronavirus which has been renamed Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) - look secondary in nature, now don't you feel safer?

Recommended Reading:
Amazing Incompetence?
Man's Got To Know His Limitations?
Ginni Rometty’s Lousy Record... - LA Times -  Michael Hiltzik
The Promised Land! - The Daily Zeitgeist - Ben Hunt
Is it a cult, or a new religious movement? - Penn Today
Philip D. Estridge - IBM Archives
Chapter 9 - IBM Corporation - Retrocomputing
Boeing: Business As Usual?