Company: IBM
Date: 2020-09-27
Overall rating: 3/5
Employment status: current
Experience level: Senior

Great Company (but reeling under the clutches of wrong leaders)
Pros: I have been with this company for a long time, so have had a chance to see leadership across decades. Firstly, long before anyone was even talking about it, IBM has stood for great values, work ethics and professionalism. I remember in the early 2000s, sellers used to often complain about unable to exist in the domestic market & esp govt sectors because IBM had a zero bribe policy and strongly were against "taking care" of clients outside work. Yet through the years, IBM's presence continued to grow. Secondly, IBM has had a great work culture focussed on not only business priorities, but strong emphasis on learning & development and constantly upgrading of future skills (even in roles where innovation/patenting was not so relevant) Thirdly, its employee/HR policies are truly world standard and has set an example through its 100+ years of transformation - the mix of cultures, employee friendly policies Fourthly, IBM is a corporation of corporations - truly it has inbuilt SW company, HW company, Services org, R&D etc..and Employees if they push themselves into it get a chance to truly experience a very diversified business areas through their career (for ex, I have worked through R&D labs, Shared Services, Sales etc..)
Cons: In the long journey with IBM, certain great "intents" have been turned into opportunistic flawed implementations -
Firstly, IBM has done many wonderful acquisitions, but has managed to retain their nativity of very few (many great companies have been acquired and killed under the weight of IBM). Thankfully hence Redhat probably did not agree to come under IBM, rather only be a 'strategic' partner.
Secondly, You can judge where the organization is headed by seeing the people who are succeeding. And I can tell you, that is definitely a very worrisome aspect. Leaders who are smart & ambitious but unfortunately people with no regard for ethics & values have started to succeed at all levels, and that is quickly eroding the rich history and culture of IBM
Thirdly, Very surprisingly the strongest functions of any organization - HR, Legal & Finance are the weakest links in IBM (HR virtually does not exist anymore as a function in IBM, in the name of responsibility & empowerment, authority has been transferred to business unit managers.)
Thirdly, Policy enforcement has been so weak that "wrong" employees have started to misuse them to the core - unlimited casual, sick leaves, WFH/flexibility offered is often taken undue advantage of, focus on diversity has become such an obsession that even merit & suitability is compromised in many cases just to "meet diversity numbers". All these are worrisome outcomes of people at the helm causing irreparable damage to the organization.