A Tale of Two IBMs

IBM cuts hundreds of jobs, sliver of 400K workers - Yahoo! Finance: "AN FRANCISCO (AP) -- IBM Corp. cut more than 1,500 jobs across a number of divisions Monday, a sliver of the technology company's nearly 400,000 workers worldwide.

IBM wouldn't comment. Documents submitted by laid-off workers to the Alliance(at)IBM, a labor union representing a small percentage of IBM employees, indicate that at least 1,518 jobs were cut. It's not known where the positions were located.

IBM, which is based in Armonk, N.Y., generally doesn't release details of its job cuts. The company's overall head count has grown over the last few years despite ongoing job cuts."

IBM to scale up India BPO operations; plans to hire 5,000- ITeS-Infotech-The Economic Times: "MUMBAI: Betting big on the India story, global IT giant IBM plans to scale up its BPO operations in the country and would hire 5,000 staff this
year.

'We plan to focus more in the services sector by opening more BPO centres in India. We would recruit at least 5,000 people to support this expansion,' IBM Poland's senior advisory consultant, Selby Mascarenhas, said in New Delhi.

IBM is bullish on the growth prospect of the services sector in the domestic economy, which ranges from software- related services to looking after the HR aspects of some core manufacturing companies, Mascarenhas said.

The IT major has decided to scale up its outsourcing operations in India at a time when many global companies, hit by the financial turmoil, have downsized their outsourcing contracts."

Making stuff is hard....

China’s Industrial Heart Facing Acute Shortage of Factory Workers - NYTimes.com: "GUANGZHOU, China — Just a year after laying off millions of factory workers, China is facing an increasingly acute labor shortage.

As American workers struggle with near double-digit unemployment, unskilled factory workers here in China’s industrial heartland are being offered signing bonuses.

Factory wages have risen as much as 20 percent in recent months...At many factories, white-collar managers and engineers were forced to spend time on assembly lines to meet deadlines before the lunar New Year, because laborers were in such short supply. The managers often struggled with the tedious but intricate tasks required to make everything from toys to DVD players“People working in the office, like me, have been asked to help on the factory floor,” said Sky Niu, the sales manager at the Hengjia Electronics Company in Dongguan. “Of course, we can only help on the simpler tasks, such as packing.”..."

Milking it for all it is worth...

MediaPost Publications Dairy Industry Backs First Lady's 'Let's Move' Effort 03/01/2010: "'The program recommends small changes that add up,' reads the ad. 'We were glad to hear that one of those changes includes drinking fat-free milk. Milk has nine essential nutrients to help kids be healthy. Eating right, drinking milk and being active for at least 60 minutes a day can help kids maintain a healthy weight. That's why we encourage kids to 'fuel up to play 60.''

The first lady's program dovetails with Milk PEP's 2010 marketing focus, which is to help moms give their kids enough nutrition via milk, Kadison says. 'We just wanted to thank [Michelle Obama] and salute her as well as moms across the country,' she says."

No Love for Lowe’s

Over the past couple of years customer service at home improvement stores has been eradicated as if it were a weed. Lowe's used to have decently knowledgeable store personnel but visits to the store over the past year have been painful experiences. These stores have taken a lesson from the airlines and pushed "self-service" to a new level.

Now it appears that Lowe's wants to show that it loves customers...No one has taught management that putting good people on the floor and paying them well is more important than paying themselves well.

Advertising - Lowe’s Puts New Emphasis on Customer’s Wants - NYTimes.com: "In a campaign for spring, which will begin this week, Lowe’s will celebrate its employees, whom the retailer calls associates, by giving the actors who play them as much screen time in the initial commercials as the actors who play customers.

The associates are portrayed as knowledgeable, helpful and friendly — the kind of sales staff needed by consumers who hope to save money by doing more household projects themselves.

The campaign is indicative of the continued focus on value and service among major retailers as shoppers keep pinching pennies. Although Lowe’s and its principal competitor, Home Depot, said last week that they saw signs of a recovery for the home-improvement industry, the monthly poll by the Conference Board of consumer confidence took a steep downturn in February."