Thread regarding Cisco Systems Inc. layoffs

If he is looking at anything in the routing or switching world:

I hope you like debugging 40 calendar years and likely over 100,000 engineering years of broken, cut and pasted, forked code. Cisco is the only company I ever worked at that allowed a significant number of its developers to be net negative relative to deadwood which is why projects scheduled for small teams for months became debugging nightmares for large teams for years. Performance improvement programs? How about making features more than ten times slower and pushing them into production because "we only hire the top 5% and they can do no wrong!" As a customer even in the 1990s with extensive testing before deploying Cisco software would fail almost immediately when deployed and had to be rolled back. Decades later I've still had to revert images over basic functionality failing. KLOCS and check-ins per week are not useful metrics.

The sad thing is some of the newer "most valuable companies on earth" are also crossing that barrier of spending more than 70% of their development dollars on bug fixing. Finding a company that can walk and chew gum at the same time (produce quality products with constant feature velocity and staying in business) remains difficult.

In the years I was there, the Cisco Lawyers were bar none the best corporate lawyers there are. Extremely creative and fun to work with. It is a good place to be a lawyer, not so good for an engineer.

a thoughtful thread for a change. some trolls, yes, but in general it's a good thread

Join for a few years, then get out before the ELT gang emerges from the shadows, knifes you in the back and then loots your pockets while you bleed out.

Tell him what he is signing up for could be great, but he needs to be in a strategic area and be very good at politics; assume that > 75% of his time will be spent playing Game of Thrones vs innovation or real impact. If he is ok with that, its a great place and pays well.

Cisco is a toxic workplace. Great place to be miserable. Only join if the alternative is homelessness.

If this is the only one, do it now. If this is the best paid one available for you, comparing with the closer one(s) and evaluate. If you have better ones, of course.

This is no brainer - given today's market. what even asking

Just list the pros and cons - there are plenty of each.

Short answer: Don't.

Long answer: DOoooooOOOOoOoOoooooon't.

@a4 so then why are you here? Must be some credence to the “disgruntled employees” you mentioned. You must be terrified you’re about to lose your job where you do the minimal amount to get by

That he better be doing your sister better than his career aspirations

why would anyone "really want to join Cisco"???

Tell said person to call Nvidia instead.

Set up a conversation with him and a co-worker for an objective view. No matter what company he decides to join they will have their bag of dirty laundry. I’d advise him to take most of the comments on this board with a grain of salt. You have the same dozen ex distruntled employees trolling who are more than likely unemployed and unable to find their next gig, hence the animosity. Good luck.

The perks are not bad at Cisco. And maybe that's what your brother-in-law is looking for at this stage of his career. Just be upfront with him about the culture, but ultimately it's his decision whether to pursue this opportunity. Don't try to convince him otherwise, or you'll end up being a bad guy.

It’s just a paycheck, it’s not the type of company you can build a career with. Work hard, take their money, but continue interviewing

I'd tell him things you posted in this message. I would not change anything. Caveat it with a statement that that's your own opinion and that it's shared with pretty much every person you work with and with 1000s of people who post on TheLayoff.com - he can read for himself here.