AOL Looking For 2,500 Volunteers to be Fired

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Hi, do you work for AOL? Would you like to volunteer to be fired? Yes? Good, here’s your pink slip, get out. Next! What about you? Would you like to volunteer to be fired?

AOL, which has already told investors that it will spend up to $200 million firing a good chunk of its staff, has now told its employees. It is looking for "up to 2,500 volunteers," CEO Tim Armstrong told his staff today. That's a third of the company's payroll.
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Sounds like they are shelling out some nice $$$ for severance packages so why sensationalism tone in the article?

If you knew the company is going downhill and was offered nice $$$ to leave, why the hell not? They will probably give more $$$ to volunteers than to people they will fire later on when funds are out.
 
thejulex said:
Sounds like they are shelling out some nice $$$ for severance packages so why sensationalism tone in the article?

If you knew the company is going downhill and was offered nice $$$ to leave, why the hell not? They will probably give more $$$ to volunteers than to people they will fire later on when funds are out.
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Makes sense.
 
It depends on the severance benefits and amounts, I might or might not take it. I'll have to do some math to figure out which makes better sense for me. Hell, I might even negotiate with the HR for a higher package if they really want me to leave ;-)
 
They are doing a good thing, offering a decent severance package and giving people a choice. Much better than the "heres your slip, get your stuff and get out" with no notice.

The amount of corporation hate going around today is insane.
 
Voluntary severance is not that unusual. Make sure you read the fine print, Azhar! And beware the taxes.
 
That's what they do where I work, they ask for volunteers, Mostly folks about to retire, and give them a nice little package. I doubt my company is going any where anytime soon.
 
thejulex said:
Sounds like they are shelling out some nice $$$ for severance packages so why sensationalism tone in the article?

If you knew the company is going downhill and was offered nice $$$ to leave, why the hell not? They will probably give more $$$ to volunteers than to people they will fire later on when funds are out.
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Yeaah I agree - and it looks much better than my experience this May - "sign this, pack your things and go away..."

 
Wow talk about sensationalism... how about reporting on whether severance packages were offered? Volunteering to leave actually tends to be beneficial to both the employer and employee.
 
srangara said:
Voluntary severance is not that unusual. Make sure you read the fine print, Azhar! And beware the taxes.
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I'd probably not volunteer. I hate not working. I'll go insane if I don't have anything to do. lol
 
Well it said spending "up to" (damn that term!!) $200M to fire 2500 people. So that translates to (up to) $80K per person on average, not a bad pay day in all fairness, better than getting a couple weeks of pay.
 
sfsuphysics said:
Well it said spending "up to" (damn that term!!) $200M to fire 2500 people. So that translates to (up to) $80K per person on average, not a bad pay day in all fairness, better than getting a couple weeks of pay.
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As long as it doesn't work out to $199M for executives and $1M for everyone else, this looks to be a pretty good program.
 
It was once common that employees helped your business to earn money, seems these days a lot of companies have a lot of redundant staff on their hands, or they've got work that could be done by robots :p
 
thejulex said:
Sounds like they are shelling out some nice $$$ for severance packages.
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:rolleyes:

Where exactly did you read that?

I read:

"This is lousy news for employees, who are faced with a "jump now or wait to be pushed" decision, but it is designed to cheer investors."

The spin off is costing $200M ...not severance packages:

The Restructuring is conditioned upon the successful completion of the Company's previously announced spin-off from Time Warner Inc. (the "Spin-off"), as well as the approval of the Company's new Board of Directors that will begin service in connection with the Spin-off. It is anticipated that, if approved, the Restructuring will include the reduction of approximately a third of the Company's current employee base, which will be conducted on a voluntary and involuntary basis. The goal of the Restructuring is to reduce ongoing annual operating costs by approximately $300 million. If the Restructuring is approved, the Company expects to incur restructuring charges of up to $200 million, substantially all of which is expected to be incurred from the date of the Spin-off through the first half of 2010.
 
My GF and her kids still use AOL despite my attempts to convince them otherwise. I was hoping that with the switch to Win7 that AOL 9.1 would not be compatible, but they go and release AOL 9.5 just recently. DIE AOL!!:p:D
 
Experian did this recently too. But they have some options. Basically you were going to be fired anyway they just worked things out as to how much severance you were going to get and how much time they would keep you employed until you found a new job.

My company laid off over 2/3 of our staff... no severance, nothing. Just a swift kick in the butt and security escorting people out. Have to keep those shareholders happy... even if that means getting rid of you most skilled employees (which also means they were paid the most).
 
Heh, last night I just had my first experience with AOL. My sister is poor so she has to use the free dial-up trial disc. The damn AOL dial-up refuses to work with the traditional windows dialer. You have to install the bloated aol dialer/garbage. It still doesn't work half of the time.

As far as AOL goes, I volunteer to help fire their employee's.
 
Hey, being asked isn't a bad way to go. I'd much rather be offered a buyout than a blindside, at least it gives the employee some sense of controlling their own destiny,
 
I volunteered to get fired once...

IIRC the exact words I used were "Fuck you! You're a fucking asshole! You're so fucking incompetent you couldn't find your ass with both hands!"
 
I am kind of surprised they use fire in this article versus lay off. Typically Fired means you were terminated with cause (basically you did something bad) and get no severance. Versus lay off, which is usually accompanied with severance, and means it was just a cost cutting measure. Kind of important difference when telling your next employer why you left your job.
 
I agree tomiboy59, After reading it again it kinda looks like Cnet just wanted some extra hits with "Fire" in the headline, when the story reads out that this is a typical "restructure" with a mass layoff.

We don't need another 2500 people pumped into the unemployment lines. I feel for the employee's but Aol are you blind did you not see this coming 10 years ago, when your subscribers cut in half! now you decide to restructure and try to compete?

Someone above said something about the hate for the big corporations, well its their fault! wake up and take a look around everyone is moving ahead but some of these big corps, that are stuck in their old way of thinking. and when they fail we are going to feel bad for them? No! I only feel bad for the employees that have to find a new job because their management sucked! and their board sat their and got rich as fast as they could then just sat back and watched it all fall.
 
I am even surprised AOL still exists.
What does AOL even do nowadays?

I havent built a PC. or used a Laptop in the last few years that even has a dialup modem in it.
So do they have cable/dsl access now?
 
interested said:
I am even surprised AOL still exists.
What does AOL even do nowadays?

I havent built a PC. or used a Laptop in the last few years that even has a dialup modem in it.
So do they have cable/dsl access now?
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I have a laptop that is 3 years old that had a modem in it. Although now, I think pretty much nothing comes with a modem. But that have AOL software for broadband. So you pay for internet, and then an extra 10 bucks a month to get the AOL GUI, etc. I remember selling it at best buy like 6 years ago. Basically I think it's people who had AOL dial-up, upgrade to broadband, and are too scared of change to try just using the internet via a browser. People are scared of change.
 
IMO this is a great opportunity for critical employees. They volunteer, get a great severance package, and when AOL realizes they just fired a critical employee and they NEED them to continue doing business they come back to that person and try to rehire them. But that person demands a higher wage or other things such as more vacation, etc, and payment for the loss of income.

Can AOL really afford this?
 
Icestation said:
I agree tomiboy59, After reading it again it kinda looks like Cnet just wanted some extra hits with "Fire" in the headline, when the story reads out that this is a typical "restructure" with a mass layoff.
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I agree, the stupid article interchangeable uses the term "fire" and "lay off" and of course the HardOCP repost parrots the mistake. They're not the same thing. If an employee is "fired", that mean he/she was let go WITH CAUSE, so as a result he/she CANNOT claim unemployment benefits (at least in California). People that are "laid off" get full benefits once their severence is accounted for.

Honestly there's nothing new about voluntary lay-offs. It happens all the time in large corporations.
 
BloodyIron said:
....and when AOL realizes they just fired a critical employee and they NEED them to continue doing business they come back to that person and try to rehire them. But that person demands a higher wage or other things such as more vacation, etc, and payment for the loss of income.
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This would be true IF 18% of the country wasn't out of work (current 10.2%, + long term unemployed). Those people are lining up for any job that opens. The tech industry is being HAMMERED right now with job cuts...
 
AOL is still around, and offering dial-up?!?!? Holy crap!!! I didn't know people still used dial-up.
 
Steve said:
This would be true IF 18% of the country wasn't out of work (current 10.2%, + long term unemployed). Those people are lining up for any job that opens. The tech industry is being HAMMERED right now with job cuts...
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So if someone writes a huge program or does something that they exclusively support and then opt in for this volunteered severance thing, I suppose just any old bum off the street can waltz in and support it, right?

One does not simply walk into critical support.

I don't suppose you've heard of job security, now have you?
 
crazyassazian said:
AOL is still around, and offering dial-up?!?!? Holy crap!!! I didn't know people still used dial-up.
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Some people still do. Sad isn't it. And not by choice either. Apparently some areas still don't have broadband, other than maybe super expensive Satellite internet.
 
Icestation said:
I feel for the employee's but Aol are you blind did you not see this coming 10 years ago, when your subscribers cut in half! now you decide to restructure and try to compete?
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The only people I see using AOL (dial-up or" for broadband") is a few 60ish ladies who don't know anything else, and can't be taught anything else (believe me - I've tried).

Personally, if I ever worked there, I would have jumped ship a LONG TIME AGO.
 
BloodyIron said:
So if someone writes a huge program or does something that they exclusively support and then opt in for this volunteered severance thing, I suppose just any old bum off the street can waltz in and support it, right?

One does not simply walk into critical support.

I don't suppose you've heard of job security, now have you?
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In my experience they usually outsource someone to re-do whatever you did. That way they pay once and don't have to worry about re-hiring someone. I've seen a few people try this thinking they will gain some kind of job security and it always backfired on them. Conversely, the ones that share and are "team players" are generally kept employed longer.
 
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