I was working at a large firm (similar to HP), a the changes were gradual, but significant:
- Hubris blow-back: Non-managers with access to HR data within my own organization would query payroll data, and publicly say developers are overpaid. This was a US public firm, not a start-up, and our pay wasn't market leading.
- Domestic hiring froze. Existing offers were rescinded. No new offers made.
- Foreign hiring or visa workers started: The internet wasn't fast enough for outsourcing at first, so new developers were brought to the US Visa from India, getting paid quite a bit less, and living 5-6 guys to an apartment in the woods of New England.
- Terminations/layoffs: The first was a shock, then came the drain of twice a year, every year, eventually becoming the norm. At first, the less technically apt were release (those who learned to program because it was hiring.) Then some really good people, with good ideas and great degrees gone because they couldn't put in the hours or work in the environment, or because they couldn't set aside their pet project.
- Cost management, control, and reduction, everywhere. Need email? billed to your department. Need storage? billed by the MB. Need licensed software? Assemble a business case for a VP, and expect to have 4 tiers of reviews before that. Need a monitor or memory? Buy it yourself, that will never get approved. Have a shadow-IT lab where all your work gets done? Expect auditors to shut it down and claim the assets for the CIO. The correct department expense number is $0.
- Project control: strict waterfall, with systems engineering of everything. Regular metrics reporting with remediation plans to executives. This requires...
- Personnel tracking: hours worked per week were introduced, starting at 1900/year, then ratcheting up. 40 per week became 44, and then it was a whisper. Managers knew, plan your top people at 50-65/week or you would blow your budget. Those top-billers brought in revenue.
- Technical advancement evaporated. Development was for the outsourced teams; if you want to move up, learn how to manage lots of outsourced developers as a "project manager."
- Projects shifted. Latitude to explore new technologies and possibilities went away. Remaining client projects were purely driven by what was needed to keep businesses moving forward, like legal/regulatory requirements.
- Governance. To make sure there's consistency, and no shadow projects, control them through review boards for everything.
Consequences?
It became a grind. The long hours worked during the dot-com era exploring the possible and creating an internet that never existed before became long hours to meet project targets, billable targets, and client deadlines.....
Marriages suffered. People skipped family events for work. People skipped exams or even dropped out of advanced degrees, for work. You could see who was burned out, or was having trouble with depression, or was self medicating in other ways.
- Hubris blow-back: Non-managers with access to HR data within my own organization would query payroll data, and publicly say developers are overpaid. This was a US public firm, not a start-up, and our pay wasn't market leading.
- Domestic hiring froze. Existing offers were rescinded. No new offers made.
- Foreign hiring or visa workers started: The internet wasn't fast enough for outsourcing at first, so new developers were brought to the US Visa from India, getting paid quite a bit less, and living 5-6 guys to an apartment in the woods of New England.
- Terminations/layoffs: The first was a shock, then came the drain of twice a year, every year, eventually becoming the norm. At first, the less technically apt were release (those who learned to program because it was hiring.) Then some really good people, with good ideas and great degrees gone because they couldn't put in the hours or work in the environment, or because they couldn't set aside their pet project.
- Cost management, control, and reduction, everywhere. Need email? billed to your department. Need storage? billed by the MB. Need licensed software? Assemble a business case for a VP, and expect to have 4 tiers of reviews before that. Need a monitor or memory? Buy it yourself, that will never get approved. Have a shadow-IT lab where all your work gets done? Expect auditors to shut it down and claim the assets for the CIO. The correct department expense number is $0.
- Project control: strict waterfall, with systems engineering of everything. Regular metrics reporting with remediation plans to executives. This requires...
- Personnel tracking: hours worked per week were introduced, starting at 1900/year, then ratcheting up. 40 per week became 44, and then it was a whisper. Managers knew, plan your top people at 50-65/week or you would blow your budget. Those top-billers brought in revenue.
- Technical advancement evaporated. Development was for the outsourced teams; if you want to move up, learn how to manage lots of outsourced developers as a "project manager."
- Projects shifted. Latitude to explore new technologies and possibilities went away. Remaining client projects were purely driven by what was needed to keep businesses moving forward, like legal/regulatory requirements.
- Governance. To make sure there's consistency, and no shadow projects, control them through review boards for everything.
Consequences?
It became a grind. The long hours worked during the dot-com era exploring the possible and creating an internet that never existed before became long hours to meet project targets, billable targets, and client deadlines.....
Marriages suffered. People skipped family events for work. People skipped exams or even dropped out of advanced degrees, for work. You could see who was burned out, or was having trouble with depression, or was self medicating in other ways.
Professional lives suffered.
Not a good time.