Struggling AT&T Plans 'Tens of Billions' In Cost Cuts, More Layoffs (arstechnica.com) 100
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: AT&T is planning tens of billions of dollars worth of cost cuts, AT&T President and COO John Stankey told investors yesterday. Stankey also discussed the future of DirecTV satellite service, saying it won't be the primary TV option AT&T pitches to most customers going forward. For the company-wide cuts, AT&T management "has looked at effectively 10 broad initiatives that we believe can generate double digits of billions over a 3-year planning cycle," Stankey said at a Morgan Stanley conference, according to a transcript posted by AT&T. One of the first of those 10 initiatives will include job cuts, which Stankey called "headcount rationalization." Stankey noted that AT&T has already been cutting jobs but said the company plans "additional work" in that area.
Longer-term cost cutting would start paying off after about two years, Stankey said. That will include "IT rationalization and architecture rationalization, turning down applications, movement to the cloud, getting cost efficiencies in our very, very broad infrastructure, some of that facilitated by portfolio rationalization." AT&T is also looking at ways to reduce electricity costs and a "billing and credit collections rationalization," Stankey said. [...] As AT&T shifts toward online-only services like AT&T TV, it is de-emphasizing the satellite service despite spending $48.5 billion to buy DirecTV in 2015. Stankey said yesterday that the future of TV is in software, not satellites, and that DirecTV will primarily be relevant in places without fast broadband: AT&T purchased DirecTV because "we like the DirecTV customer base, thought it was attractive," Stankey said. But "shortly after that [acquisition], we made it clear that we would be developing a software platform that would ultimately not only take our satellite base and offer them a more updated product, but be the replacement for the U-verse [wireline TV service]," he said.
Longer-term cost cutting would start paying off after about two years, Stankey said. That will include "IT rationalization and architecture rationalization, turning down applications, movement to the cloud, getting cost efficiencies in our very, very broad infrastructure, some of that facilitated by portfolio rationalization." AT&T is also looking at ways to reduce electricity costs and a "billing and credit collections rationalization," Stankey said. [...] As AT&T shifts toward online-only services like AT&T TV, it is de-emphasizing the satellite service despite spending $48.5 billion to buy DirecTV in 2015. Stankey said yesterday that the future of TV is in software, not satellites, and that DirecTV will primarily be relevant in places without fast broadband: AT&T purchased DirecTV because "we like the DirecTV customer base, thought it was attractive," Stankey said. But "shortly after that [acquisition], we made it clear that we would be developing a software platform that would ultimately not only take our satellite base and offer them a more updated product, but be the replacement for the U-verse [wireline TV service]," he said.
Rationalization (Score:5, Funny)
Today's new office bingo buzzword in lieu of "rightsizing" or the more direct "cost cutting" which sounds so passe' when you can use the hot new bourgeois term - Rationalization!
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Today's new office bingo buzzword in lieu of "rightsizing" or the more direct "cost cutting" which sounds so passe' when you can use the hot new bourgeois term - Rationalization!
What's next: "headcount blockchaining"?
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Wow, if that word came up on someone's scorecard and they won, they'd need a special prize. I remember at one company I worked at, the CEO loved the sound of his own voice. We had weekly, all-employee meetings that he would talk at us for the whole thing. No one else ever spoke and nothing of actual value was said. We finally did make bingo scorecards and really played the game at the meetings. In the middle of one sentence, one employee 'won,' actually stood at the meeting and yelled "BULLSHIT!" The
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Sadly, this was the employer that made me realize the FTC was fucking useless. CEO was running a racket. The CEO himself was so crooked and slimey that if you said "hello" to him, he automatically wondered what your angle is and tried to figure out how you were screwing him over. There was a reason everyone hated him. So, a FTC investigation of us was triggered. I knew investigators were coming and why and I was the head of the filing department. I was told to 'get ready for them.' My definition was
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This term is used commonly among the Brits for this situation. As used in this article, it's exactly what it means.
Another explination:
In cases where you have a fraction with a radical in the denominator, you can use a technique called rationalizing a denominator to eliminate the radical. The point of rationalizing a denominator is to make it easier to understand what the quantity really is by removing radicals from the denominators.
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James Bond: "I'm to eliminate all free radicals"
Money Penny: "Oh my, do be careful James!"
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This term is used commonly among the Brits for this situation. As used in this article, it's exactly what it means.
But it's obviously used by AT&T (mostly American, AFAIK) to avoid saying "mass firing", "mass layoffs" or "job cuts" - I searched their release, and none of those terms are mentioned, only the "rationalization" term. They're just tip-toeing around what it really is they're doing.
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I think Restructuring includes cutting some of the more useless executive positions, but that won't happen at AT&T until the company implodes into a black hole.
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They're just tip-toeing around what it really is they're doing.
Their overuse of euphemisms just shows that they're trying to rationalize their actions.
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I guess you could take that stance, but why does it matter what they call it? Do you feel like they're trying to fool you? And if so, then why care about that? The very Nature of the universe fools us all.
Re:Rationalization (Score:4, Insightful)
It's mostly a symptom. Rationalizations like that are often used when you're doing something you know to be wrong.
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Just because you aren't familiar with a management term, doesn't make it a buzzward. The phrase is over 30 years old.
Also, it isn't necessarily the same as cost cutting.
You can rightsize by adding certain costs.
If you lack of laborer is causing you to lose money, you can rightsize by hiring people.
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Just because you aren't familiar with a management term, doesn't make it a buzzward. The phrase is over 30 years old.
Also, it isn't necessarily the same as cost cutting.
You can rightsize by adding certain costs.
If you lack of laborer is causing you to lose money, you can rightsize by hiring people.
Just because it's old doesn't mean it's not a buzzword. If it's a management term, odds are it's a buzzword or bullshit doublespeak.
Name two times where someone in management / marketing applied the "rightsizing" label to some proposal that involved increased expenditure.
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This has a greater implication than just closing stores. Trademarked products (Craftsman, Lands End) are being sold off, the CEO purchases the rights to the appliance moniker Krenmore, and perhaps more.
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If they keep inventing new words, we're going to have to start allowing synonyms in our games of buzzword bingo!
CEOs inventing buzzwords? (Score:5, Informative)
which Stankey called "headcount rationalization."
I know times are tough, but really, call it what it fucking is: layoffs.
oh and this gold nugget too... (Score:2)
Stankey noted that AT&T has already been cutting jobs but said the company plans "additional work" in that area.
"additional work in that area" (read: "future layoffs").
It's not layoffs (Score:4, Interesting)
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layoffs are when you're let go with the assumption that you'll come back when production ramps up. It's a seasonal thing that factory workers experience. These are mass firings. Likely to eliminate redundancies after a series of mergers.
True (which I didn't know), however it's not necessarily referred to that only when it's temporary: MW 'layoff' [merriam-webster.com]
Also true (Score:2)
Re:It's not layoffs (Score:4, Insightful)
MW takes a descriptiveist approach (as it should). The term layoff used to always mean temporary. Then corporate started using it when they meant permanent termination to try to soften the backlash. They did that so much that the word no longer implies a temporary situation at all.
Way WAY back, a layoff sometimes included some small stipend to assure availability for work when things picked up again. Now, during our supposedly 'booming' economy, that is no longer seen as necessary to assure a sufficient pool of applicants.
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It's not so black and white. I would go so far as to say the dictionary is not wrong, but with a big fat asterisk. Otherwise, we get Newspeak sooner or later.
I do credit MW for shading that by saying "often temporarily".
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I thought "furlough" was used to describe a temporary situation. Some years ago the company I worked for did one to everyone for a week over the holidays to save $.
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It's literally what it means. As in "lay off that production line!".
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Firing implies cause, as in no unemployment insurance. Agreed, a layoff usually implies a worker could be called back. However, there is such a thing as a permanent layoff that may include a package (like severance pay) & being able to qualify for unemployment insurance payments. Calling in a "firing" makes it sound like there was a performance, attendance, or some other serious 'issue.
I completely agree with you on what these cuts really are & why. AT&T (SBC) seems to really not want to hav
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A corporation's ONLY purpose is to generate money. That's it. It's not taking care of its employees, or taking care of the environment, or making sure the rest of us have air to breathe or water to drink. ONLY. MAKE. MONEY.
If that happens to kill people in the process, well we here in America have a remedy for that too!
We look the other way while their friends slap them on the wrist in a bit of TV Theater that has zero meaning or effect. Then we comfort ourselves that we're in control.
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Carte Blanche (Score:2)
Re:Carte Blanche (Score:5, Interesting)
When will these companies realize that offering us the ability to create custom TV packages is the way forward?
They are not allowed to do that, by the companies that own the content.
I watch ESPN and maybe 10 other channels and I suspect that's the case with most people.
If only I could get the option to not subsidize ESPN for everyone else. But I get your point.
Re: Carte Blanche (Score:2)
When will these companies realize that offering us the ability to create custom TV packages is the way forward?
You can already do this. Cut the cord, and sign up for streaming. But you're still going to subsidize content you don't care about.
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Some niche are need to address the cross culture America.
"people can already use the internet for all that stuff."
how middle class. There are people in the US that can not afford internet.
but sure, cut off the 'niche' citizen from society so you can watch knuckle draggers throw a ball for a few pennies less.meanwhile the rest of us who don't want ESPN have to keep paying a 40% increase in our cable bill for a thing we don't watch.
If it was pay for what you watch, Your cable bill would actual go up because o
tieing locals to cable channles needs to go! (Score:2)
tieing locals to cable channels needs to go!
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how middle class. There are people in the US that can not afford internet.
But they can afford cable? Go away troll.
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Blame the companies that own the channels for why you can't get a-la-carte. Disney for example requires providers that want any of the vast amount of Disney content to include ESPN in the lowest-tier package rather than putting it in a higher tier package or a separate sports package.
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AT&T TV (Score:5, Interesting)
We are dropping our satellite broadcasts and moving that bandwidth over to our 5G service. If you wanted to watch TV, you had better sign up for a wireless broadband plan.
Sorry about all you people in rural communities. We got your satellite and OTA* TV bandwidth. But we have no plans to serve you. I guess you should have elected a smarter FCC chairman.
*Except for the Jesus channels. We won't touch those.
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I guess you should have elected a smarter FCC chairman.
You think getting paid millions makes him stupid?
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Never attribute to malice .... yadda, yadda.
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I thinking cutting out the knees of America is always stupid, no matter how much you get paid.
This fucking idea the money = smarts is tiresome, stop it.
Re:AT&T TV (Score:5, Insightful)
If Starlink comes off even half as well as advertised it is going to absolutely crush everyone else in the providing internet to rural customers department. Their filings suggest a $60/mo price point and it will work in places where even Exede doesn't, and requires no aiming which means lower setup costs. ATT can go fuck themselves sideways, I hope they die the death of a thousand dogs, amen.
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"Replacing live TV with Starlink doesn't make all that much sense."
It makes sense to anyone who doesn't want to watch whatever ATT is shoveling.
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If Starlink comes off even half as well as advertised it is going to absolutely crush everyone else in the providing internet to rural customers department. Their filings suggest a $60/mo price point and it will work in places where even Exede doesn't, and requires no aiming which means lower setup costs. ATT can go fuck themselves sideways, I hope they die the death of a thousand dogs, amen.
That's insulting to dogs.
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No matter how excited you get, I don't think anyone will be bringing back the pro NAZI comics you so desperately want to masturbate to.
AT&T should never have been allowed to buy Dir (Score:5, Interesting)
Note that the cable monopolies are not natural monopolies. They're government-granted monopolies. The local government (usually city or county) decided to prohibit all cable companies except one from providing service in the area. So this isn't something that can be fixed by the market. The government either needs to fix it (clamp down on cable companies overcharging), or take its finger off the scales so the market can fix it (allow competing cable companies). Unfortunately, in many cases i suspect the local governments are in bed with the cable companies. The previous city I lived in, the city negotiated a kickback scheme where every month Verizon would pay them $x per household hooked up with FIOS.
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There was a matter of practicality. Laying cable is expensive, right-of-ways have to be granted, and two or three cable companies all running their own cable would have caused infrastructure problems. It made some sense several decades ago. The only way around it would have been to either force the companies building the infrastructure to lease space, or to have levels of government directly lay the cable and then lease it out. It doesn't make nearly as much sense now, since fiber is taking over in a big wa
Of course. (Score:4, Insightful)
If you treat your customers like shit they look for other options.
But-But.. Tax Cuts! (Score:5, Insightful)
So, all those Federal tax cuts didn't save AT&T from implosion? Hmm.
I'm on a boat (Score:2)
So, all those Federal tax cuts didn't save AT&T from implosion? Hmm.
How can those tax cuts be useful when I spent them all on my vacation and new hot rides first?
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They need more tax cuts. Privatize the profits, socialize the losses.
AT&T has been dying for years. (Score:3)
Ten, huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
"has looked at effectively 10 broad initiatives that we believe can generate double digits of billions over a 3-year planning cycle,"
Let me guess; cutting executive salaries and benefits isn't one of those.
Re: Ten, huh? (Score:4)
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No, because executives make like 0.01 billion instead of 10 billion.
Also fun exercise: divide executive cash compensation by employee headcount. It shows the relative wage power (i.e. how much more you could pay employees if the executive wasn't paid). For Walmart's CEO, that's 1/5 of 1 cent per hour. (Stock awards are just printed money, and paying employees in stock would rapidly decline the share price and leave the employees with nothing; plus you have to pay regular income tax on them, e.g. a $1
How about C level pay cuts? (Score:5, Informative)
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I was thinking the same thing. Looks like ther'es a whole bunch of folks making $10-15 million a year. It takes a pretty brilliant CEO to come up with their extremely successful business strategies then continued brilliance to recommend cutting costs to save money.
https://www1.salary.com/ATandT... [salary.com]
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"Equity" is just stock issue, not a cost to the business. It doesn't count for this computation (i.e. issuing $100M of stock as compensation costs the business $0). It does count for the regular income tax computation (i.e. if you get $100M of stock and $400,000 of cash, you're going to owe the IRS $40M of taxes).
Take the cash comp and other (i.e. benefits, which do cost money) for Stephenson, $8,530,538, and divide by the 251,840 employees, and you get $33.87 per employee per year, or $0.016/hr wage p
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These and past job cuts are being done to offset the cost of the $1,000 bonuses AT&T paid out [cnbc.com] after the Trump tax cuts.
Cost cutting measures (Score:5, Funny)
They don't seem to be struggling to me (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:They don't seem to be struggling to me (Score:4, Informative)
see here [att.com]. Seem to be doing just fine. Seems more like what's happening is more layoffs that follow the constant mergers and acquisitions. Sure would be nice if we had some anti-trust laws, yes sir.
What is it you think anti-trust would do here? There is no monopoly in play. The struggles are internal to the company, not to the market place. There is nothing in anti-trust preventing a telco from buying a satellite TV company. It's just a shit company being a shit company. Guess what, you don't have to give them any money if you don't want to.
Did you just learn the words anti-trust in school today and you ran home looking for a way to use them?
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see here [att.com]. Seem to be doing just fine. Seems more like what's happening is more layoffs that follow the constant mergers and acquisitions. Sure would be nice if we had some anti-trust laws, yes sir.
I don't think this is an anti-trust issue, but the first part of your post is quite right. I've been in an investment club for a long time and one of our holdings is AT&T. Some other guy in the club suggested it for purchase - I'm not to blame for this. But it means that I know a bit about it. AT&T has done a ton of acquisitions in recent years and they always pay cash, so their debt load right now is enormous. I suspect that these "layoffs" (yeah, they are really firings as others have stat
Oddly enough (Score:2)
Lowering prices is not one thing they thought of.
Cutting "suits" salaries would be where I start (Score:3)
Customer Base (Score:3)
Then they tried to use DirecTV brand recognition for their streaming service DirecTV Now. Which just served to confuse existing customers unable to access the service with their login information. Fun times!
Job Cuts (Score:5, Interesting)
Job cuts = more "overbooked" techs that don't show when they're scheduled to.
I had an issue with AT&T's fiber internet connection 2 months back (new customer) and it took 4 attempts to get a tech to come out to troubleshoot and replace the ONT. I would have done it myself only there's no way to get a replacement ONT or gateway directly from AT&T... or so I was told by the customer service rep.
During each of the prior 3 days when a tech was scheduled to come out but didn't show up, I was later told by the customer service rep that the tech was "overbooked."
When a tech finally showed up, I asked him why it took so long. He said it was due to their last round of layoffs: AT&T cuts another 1,800 jobs as it finishes fiber-Internet buildout [arstechnica.com]
This latest round of job cuts could be due to pressure from a hedge fund investor.
From AT&T Union Says Elliott’s Proposals Could Affect 30,000 Jobs [bloomberg.com]:
"In September, billionaire Paul Singer’s New York hedge fund disclosed a new $3.2 billion position in AT&T, along with a plan to boost the telecom and media giant’s share price by more than 50% through asset sales and cost cutting. The fund hasn’t specifically called for job cuts. AT&T has said it has no plans to dispose of DirecTV, but Elliott could potentially engage in a proxy battle to push its agenda through."
Re:Job Cuts (Score:4, Insightful)
Pump and dump ..
I'll stick with my attic antenna (Score:2)
Nowhere in their plans will there be (Score:2)
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And especially no cuts to executive positions, salaries, benefits or stock options.
AT&T executive salaries (Score:3)
Shocked, shocked I say! (Score:2)
Their service sucks, their customer service is a joke, and it's ridiculously overpriced.
Couldn't happen to a nic....more deserving company. I hope they crash and burn, and the remnants are sold for scrap.
Maybe trump was right? (Score:3, Informative)
Trump in 2017: “As an example of the power structure I'm fighting, AT&T is buying Time Warner and thus CNN, a deal we will not approve in my administration because it's too much concentration of power in the hands of too few.”
And the trouble for AT&T with the merger is the $108 billion in debt from the merger. AT&T had $162 billion in debt by the end of Sept 2019, mostly from its mergers. By the end of 2019, it was up to $163.1 billion.
In 2011 AT&T had a A2 credit rating. It’s now Baa2, 2 steps above junk.
I think if Trump’s administration had blocked the AT&T/Warner merger, it would have done AT&T a favor.
It was Judge Richard Leon that allowed the merger (the Justice Department sued to stop it). He also in 2011 “handed the tobacco industry a big victory by blocking a new federal requirement that cigarette packs carry graphic warning labels.“ It appears he likes big business.
And yet . . . (Score:5, Interesting)
AT&T announced they are going to accelerate their $4 billion stock buyback program [marketwatch.com]. This is on top of the $4 billion stock buyback program they're already in the process of completing.
Because they need to cut costs.
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While they deny it, they seem to target those who are closest to retirement first by either laying them off, or outsourcing them to a third party company like IBM or Accenture. ( Who will soak them for their knowledge for about a year, then lay them off so they can outsource that position to India. )
According to this article [foxnews.com], that practice is called "rebadging". From the article:
The employee, who spent nearly two decades at AT&T, was informed a few months ago that she was no longer needed, and was being "rebadged" to consulting company Accenture, where she'd be forced to train a low-cost foreign replacement. She told "Tucker Carlson Tonight" that she expects to be fired within a year.
45 (Score:1)
So i am guessing all of those tax cuts didn't help ?
Cut Billions? (Score:2)
There's that "Billions" they need to cut. Which upper management genius thought it was a good idea to pay nearly $50 Million for a struggling satellite TV service only to scrap it 5 years later?
It would appear that AT&T could save the most money by beginning the layoffs at the TOP of the employee pyramid, not the bottom. I wonder how many million$ in bonuses and perks the management guy who pushed the DirecTV deal through made. Start the layoffs
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That would be a good policy to put in the constitution. The persian advising layoffs is the first to be laid off. Period, and with only the standard benefits everyone else gets.
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AT&T didn't actually want the satellite TV service and that isn't what they paid $48.5 million for. What they wanted, and paid for, is control of the contracts that DirecTV had with the copyright cartels. Even though AT&T wasn't legally allowed to move DirecTV's content to their services with those existing contracts, the fact that AT&T now controlled one of the bigger 'cable' providers, the copyright cartels had to come to the negotiating table with AT&T where they had been ignoring them
Leverage (Score:2)
Let's be honest here. The only reason AT&T bought DirecTV was to gain leverage for negotiations with the media copyright cartels. They don't want the employees, they don't want the offices and they don't wan't the satellites either.
His name is John Stankey (Score:3)
John. Stankey.
Anytime you're feeling held back, just remember that a guy named John Stankey became a chief executive.
Don't let anything hold you back!
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Fuckem! (Score:1)
AT&T has been torturing our family for years with Wells-Fargo-like ghost charges, and telemarketing. Karma's a bitch.
Die, AT&T, die! (Score:2)