#pr

https://www.efinancialcareers.com/news/xing-citi-jon-lofthouse

Put it down in your calendar for April 29th, 2031. Remember to check (in 2031) if IBM did, indeed, hire 750 people in Chicago for "quantum" something.

http://techrights.org/n/2026/05/02/Thousands_of_Layoffs_at_IBM_So_IBM_Pays_Mainstream_Media_to_Cla.shtml

I've seen posts here saying if you get an inconsistent on a PR that you're done. But also posts saying that it's being mandated now for a certain number of people to get scored low. So which of these is it? Is it a sure sign of a layoff, or is it just happening a lot more often now?

Obviously. A history of bad calls that go nowhere means PR fluff has no power left. I'll believe it when I see it. Color me suspicious.

Just watched Trump blowing smoke up MD's skirt saying MD creates a great product. All Trump Fund talk

https://fortune.com/2025/11/30/cisco-chief-product-officer-jeetu-patel-work-life-balance-not-equal-two-exceptions-for-success/

Maybe someone should inform him that you get a "E" for Effort and an "A" for Achievement. No one cares how long you work! At his level, results matter, not time on the clock.

Hans can fu-k up and he gets a nice bonus. In comes Dan, lies with a sh---y PR statement. Communication company with sh-t communication, gets rid of productive workers with great track records, but the bosses fu-k it up.

“We have nothing new to report and we cannot comment on online rumors and speculation, though much of what has been reported is false and inaccurate,” Spokesperson - Kevin Israel (Crisis Communications and Reputation Management at Verizon)

Keep reposting this: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/08/senate-republicans-trump-obamacare

If/when the government eliminates ACA, how will it impact layoffs at Optum?

At BNY, leadership isn’t something you do—it’s something you post about. In this gilded age of corporate theater, where substance is optional but hashtags are mandatory, BNY has perfected the art of appearing important while doing absolutely nothing of measurable value. Welcome to the House of Optics™, where the louder you are on Teams, the closer you are to God (or at least to a LinkedIn shoutout from someone with “Global” or "Head" in their title).

Let’s begin with the sacred ritual of the Selfie of Significance™. At BNY, no moment is too trivial to commemorate with a front-facing camera and a forced grin. Did you attend a 15-minute “Leadership Listening Session” where no one listened and nothing was led? That’s a selfie. Did you stand near a VP while they cut a ribbon on a building funded by tax credits and the dreams of displaced mid-career professionals? That’s a selfie. Did you walk past a banner that said “Innovation Starts Here” while wondering what your job actually is? Selfie. Bonus points if you tag the Executive Committee member who once waved in your general direction at a town hall.

But the real magic happens in the Testimonial Industrial Complex™, where associates are gently nudged (read: strongly encouraged) to post about how “energized,” “inspired,” and “humbled” they are to be in the presence of greatness—greatness being defined as someone who once said “synergy” in a meeting without laughing. These testimonials are often indistinguishable from hostage notes, except with more emojis and fewer demands. “Feeling so proud to be part of today’s strategic alignment session with our fearless leader!” reads one post, accompanied by a photo of a man in a Patagonia vest nodding at his own PowerPoint.

Leadership at BNY is not measured by outcomes, impact, or even basic competence. It is measured by decibel level and calendar saturation. The true leaders are those who speak the most in Teams meetings, regardless of whether they say anything. In fact, saying nothing is preferred—it reduces the risk of accountability. The goal is to be seen speaking, not heard making sense. Bonus points for using phrases like “double-click,” “value prop,” and “let’s circle back” in a single breathless monologue.

And oh, the meetings. BNY has elevated the Meeting as Performance Art to an Olympic sport. There are meetings to plan meetings, meetings to debrief meetings, and meetings to align on the outcomes of meetings that never had outcomes. If you’re not in at least six simultaneous Teams calls, are you even leading?

Meanwhile, the Executive Committee floats above it all, like a celestial body emitting vague strategic radiation. They are thanked profusely in every post, regardless of their involvement. “Huge thanks to [Insert EC Member] for their visionary leadership!” reads a caption beneath a photo of a hallway. No one knows what the EC actually does, but their names are invoked like corporate deities—part reverence, part insurance policy.

But BNY’s pièce de résistance is its Public Diversion Strategy™, a masterclass in distraction marketing. While morale craters and more layoffs loom, the company unveils a new building, a new partnership, or a new initiative with a state college mascot no one’s heard of. These announcements are accompanied by drone footage, branded cupcakes, and LinkedIn posts with captions like “So proud to be part of this journey!”—a journey that, coincidentally, involves replacing experienced professionals with interns and new college grads who think COBOL is a TikTok dance.

These partnerships are not about education or community impact. They are about labor arbitrage agreements with a side of PR frosting. BNY receives generous economic development credits to build “pipelines” of low-cost, inexperienced talent while quietly offboarding seasoned employees like expired yogurt. The message is clear: if you’ve been here long enough to know how things work, you’re a liability. Please collect your commemorative stress ball and don't let the door hit you in the a*ss on the way out!

And yet, the illusion persists. Awards, merit and promotions are given for “visibility,” not value. Promotions go to those who master the art of Strategic Echoing™—repeating what someone just said, but louder and with a slide. Recognition is bestowed upon those who “lean in” to performative enthusiasm, not those who quietly deliver results. The loudest voice in the room is assumed to be the smartest, even if it’s just reading the agenda out loud.

In this ecosystem, actual accomplishment is a liability. It implies you were focused on work instead of cultivating your personal brand. Worse, it might make others look bad. The safest path to success is to be loud, visible, and vaguely inspirational. Think TED Talk energy, but with less content and more acronyms. Afterall, who started this practice and how has this become the fabric of the Robin Vince BNY culture?

So what’s the lesson here? At BNLie, it’s not about what you do—it’s about what you appear to do. Leadership is not a function of impact, but of optics, volume, and proximity to power. The currency of success is not competence, but curated enthusiasm and PR hype. And the ultimate sin is not failure—it’s silence.

So smile for the camera, tag your favorite executive, and remember: the building may be empty, the strategy may be incoherent, and the talent may be fleeing—but as long as the LinkedIn post gets 100 likes and 450 impressions, everything is fine with the personal brand.

AT&T just launched a shiny new ad campaign trashing tmobile – because nothing screams confidence like obsessing over your competitor's success.

They're bragging about "300,000 square miles of coverage" and the " AT&T Guarantee" Meanwhile, real customers on Truspilot are handing out 1-star reviews like Halloween candy. MAYBE fix your OWN moral and coverage before worrying about someone else's.

It's wild watching a 100-year-old company, drowning in debt and bad PR, act like a jealous ex. TMOBILE over there sitting comfortably at a $200 stock price, while AT&T's bragging about fiber and posting apology ads.

When your own employees are miserable, your customers are furious, and your stock is flatlined – maybe stop worrying about T-Mobile and start reconnecting with reality.

SM was interviewed by the Motley Fool. Seems very fitting.

Is this good or just smoke and mirrors?

Several C-levels called out by name on LinkedIN for bad customer service.
Not the first time.
WE know that they never cared about employees, even less than customers.
Difference is, you can't fire customers. But THEY can fire YOU and claim FRAUD.
Sooo, WHICH C-level will put his tool belt on, and fix this thing, because they know everything better than anyone else?
Oooor, ANSWER the PHONE (gasp) in a call center that has yet another WHINING customer on the phone?
Ooor, claim 'isolated incident' caused by disgruntled ex-employees?
Ooor, [Insert spin here].
Let the screaming (or laughs) begin..

Is it at all possible the rumors are wrong? Target still has openings listed on indeed. We’ve heard nothinb(not that we would before they wanted us to). Is it at all possible? I still don’t think they are going to want even more bad pr. Or am I just wishing it?

Does anyone else feel like targets identity crisis and pr image is as responsible for the decline in sales as anything else? The only thing that makes me think MAYBE there won’t be layoffs is because it really would make Target look sooooo much worse to fire people this close to the holidays and would further perpetuate that image of a company self sabotaging their image. I know they will try to spin it as streamlining and becoming more efficient but I think the public will see through that. The Minnesota nice will fade completely. Any thoughts?

To poke this administration. Why, why come out with this media stance now? Keep your head down and plow ahead with your plan. No need to pick a public fight. I haven’t seen a single company win from posturing like this. Apple , Boeing , NVIDIA, Microsoft…. Not a single one has come out on top. If we can bite our tongue to do business in countries with dubious human rights track records, surely we could STFU and just plow ahead silently for 3 years and 3 months more
And to what end, so we can all feel better that we have publicly signaled this.. what’s the point if we just end up getting shadow banned in the permitting and less than favorable tariff carve outs… good grief.
https://www.ft.com/content/7e3a2879-d7d9-40a3-8ea8-ae89a9e29121

https://www.businessinsider.com/ford-ceo-uses-japanese-toyota-management-strategy-to-make-decisions-2025-10

Who is paying to have these fluff pieces written about our chief mo--n? This is utter rubbish and there have been no smart decisions by the C-suite during his reign.

I ask anyone to name 1 decision that has a positive outcome.

https://syncni.com/article/14123/how-allstate-ni-s-activate-event-is-redefining-workplace-culture

EL SEGUNDO, California (October 3, 2025) — On Thursday, October 2, at approximately 9:30 pm, a fire occurred at the Chevron El Segundo Refinery. The incident took place at a processing unit located near the southeast corner of the facility. Following Chevron’s active response along with support from the cities of El Segundo and Manhattan Beach emergency services, the fire is now out. As a result, Chevron has launched an internal investigation to determine the cause.

Throughout the night, Chevron’s emergency response team has been actively managing the situation with a primary focus on ensuring the safety of employees, responders and the community. All personnel and contractors have been accounted for, and no injuries have been reported. As a precautionary measure, Chevron’s Health Safety and Environmental team has been conducting mobile air monitoring in the community.
Chevron is actively working with local, state and federal agencies, including CalOSHA, CALOSPR and the South Coast Air Quality Management District, who were notified and are monitoring the incident. Chevron is also providing information updates to the California Energy Commission (No period)

Additional updates will be provided as more information is available.

-- END --

Chevron's October 3rd press release about the El Segundo refinery incident is a masterclass in minimization - and a troubling case study in what happens when cost-cutting meets critical infrastructure.

Let's start with the obvious: this wasn't a "fire" as Chevron's sanitized language suggests. Witnesses reported a massive explosion visible for miles. By downplaying the severity in their opening sentence, Chevron immediately undermines their credibility. This is corporate crisis management 101 - control the narrative by controlling the vocabulary.

This incident didn't happen in a vacuum. It follows significant workforce reductions in precisely the departments designed to prevent such disasters: health and safety, operations, and process safety teams. When you cut the people who exist to identify hazards, maintain equipment, and ensure operational integrity, you're not "streamlining" - you're gambling with public safety. This explosion may be the bill coming due.

Someone should tell Chevron's PR team that using "actively" three times in a two-paragraph statement doesn't make their response sound more... active. It makes it sound desperate. "Actively managing," "actively working," "active response" - it's linguistic padding that screams "we need to sound like we're in control."

When companies reduce headcount in safety-critical roles, they often claim they're becoming "more efficient" or "optimizing operations." What they rarely admit is that they're accepting higher risk. Every refinery operator cut is one less person watching gauges. Every process safety engineer laid off is one less person reviewing procedures. Every HSE specialist let go is one less voice saying "wait, this isn't safe."
This press release is exactly what you'd expect from a company trying to manage public perception while potentially sitting on the consequences of their own cost-cutting decisions.

Bottom Line: Chevron wants you to believe this was a minor incident, professionally handled. The reality - a massive explosion at a facility that recently shed safety personnel - tells a different story. The community deserves better than corporate euphemisms and the word "actively" used as a credibility substitute.

Sabre put out a PR on Sept 25 saying Sabre GDS shopping produced lower fares 49% of the time compared to airline.com. Airline.com did better only on 1% of searches. A comparison of Sabre GDS Shopping to airline.com is meaningless. airline.com does not have corp fares or negotiated fares. So the comparison is apples to oranges. If anything the comparison should be against airline direct content with NDC. Very misleading PR and this is an embarrassment.

If the KRK shopping team and marketing came up with this analysis (who else could have?), they should be fired.

Well, if I had to guess, theft is the railroads biggest problem in these two cities, I am sure many others as well.

The praise makes for a good laugh!

https://www.wowt.com/2025/09/16/trump-says-union-pacific-ceo-gave-advice-national-guard-deployments/?outputType=amp

I was going out to meet some friends this weekend for drinks and took an Uber. The driver stated he ditched his corporate gig about 2 years ago and has been doing Uber ever since and would never go back to a corporate sh-t hole. He asked me what I did for a living and I told him I work for SF. (I was embarrassed) I told him about all the cr-p that SF puts people through, how they treat their employees and how horrible the service is. He said I was the 3rd person he had heard that from lately that worked for SF. He said he was cancelling his auto policy and would let all the other Uber drivers know. He agreed and said it sounds like a total living h-ll hole. Go Progressive!

http://techrights.org/n/2025/09/14/Satya_s_Plan_B_Try_to_Hide_the_Massive_Extent_Scale_Scope_of_Mi.shtml

https://www.carcomplaints.com/Ford/

Check it out and add your complaints to the site.

@OP+1k4t1ksy3

SEE LINK BELOW - THIS IS WHY OUR STOCK IS TANKING OUT BIG TIME - HOW COULD SOMETHING LIKE THIS HAPPEN? A MAXIMUM SEVERITY RATING OF 10 OUT OF A POSSIBLE 10 ON S/4HANA and NETWEAVER PRODUCTS - ARE YOU KIDDING??

Who is responsible for this?

https://arstechnica.com/security/2025/09/as-hackers-exploit-one-high-severity-sap-flaw-company-warns-of-3-more/

No public relations announcements will cover this up.

This is pretty serious news that will definitely impact SAP sales going forward. Just who would now want to buy SAP with 3 of our major products now exposed to a "high-severity vulnerability"

What has happened to this company??

Dear UHC? Is this really happening?

I actually love this approach. It’s like a Hallmark channel for corporate PR: scripted, heartwarming, and just enough to distract from the plot twist nobody asked about.

You cannot make this up. See Arvind going by Arvid last Thursday with Jim Cramer. Amateur hour, dumpster fire, imposter syndrome going on at IBM for far too long. => https://www.cnbc.com/video/2025/09/04/ibm-ceo-arvid-krishna-sits-down-with-jim-cramer.html

notice that belk made a press release about donating $50K yesterday ( a drop in the bucket for a large corporation) after questions where raised about where store level charity sale money ends up.

Have you all noticed the significant amount of leadership attention being given to our new analysts and interns lately?

It's quite fascinating to observe this trend, especially with all the packed events in NYC and other locations. It seems like the company media is using social engineering and a controlled audience to portray our current culture as vibrant and dynamic. This is intentional not coincidental.

You might have seen the emails and social media posts with RV and other leaders snapping selfies and mingling with the wide-eyed enthusiastic head-bobbing analysts and interns, who, if you look closely, appear to be sipping bottles of baby formula and Pedialyte while captivated by the experience!

Analysts and interns seem to be the primary internal audience that leadership has found receptive recently. Clearly, leadership is using this audience to create a false narrative and skew perceptions about the current overall corporate culture as being vibrant, dynamic and humming.

No. 5 on PEOPLE's 100 Companies That Care in 2025 list. Because, why not?

https://people.com/100-companies-that-care-list-2025-11784812

Ah, the holidays Coming soon — that magical time when companies drape their logos in twinkling lights, release tear-je-king ads about “family values,” and then quietly toss employees out the back door like expired fruitcake.

Nothing says “Merry Christmas” quite like a calendar invite titled Mandatory HR Meeting on Thanksgiving or December 23rd. It’s corporate efficiency at its finest — cut payroll before year’s end, bump the stock price, and still make it to the CEO’s chalet in Aspen for eggnog.

The PR department will churn out phrases like “right-sizing” and “strategic restructuring” — translation: we’re firing you to protect executive bonuses. After all, someone’s got to pay for the CEO’s holiday Rolex and the board’s catered champagne toast.

And while they sip their peppermint lattes and congratulate themselves on “tough decisions,” real people are at home explaining to their kids why Santa suddenly downsized his operations this year. Nothing warms the heart like watching holiday lights reflect off the foreclosure notice.

If companies want to be honest, they should ditch the fake holiday cheer and just run commercials that say: “From all of us in upper management, thanks for your years of service — and don’t let the door hit you on your way to the unemployment line.”

Because in corporate America, the season of giving is really the season of taking — taking jobs, taking dignity, and taking every last shred of goodwill before the year-end financials hit.