#strategy

Companies poured billions into AI with sky-high expectations. It was supposed to be the ultimate productivity hack — slashing costs, supercharging innovation, and delivering effortless competitive advantage. Executives bet big that generative AI and automation would be the simple solution to margin pressure, talent shortages, and sluggish growth.

Now the reckoning is here.

Early pilots looked magical. Chatbots answered queries, code assistants sped up development, and analytics tools promised smarter decisions. But scaling those wins across the enterprise is proving far more expensive and complicated than the headlines suggested.

The costs are piling up: massive compute infrastructure, eye-watering energy consumption, specialized talent that commands premium salaries, constant model retraining, and the hidden expense of integrating brittle AI systems into legacy workflows. Many organizations are discovering that AI doesn’t magically replace headcount — it often requires more people to manage, monitor, and refine outputs. Hallucinations, bias issues, and compliance risks add further friction and potential liability.

The result? A growing number of leaders are quietly coming to terms with a harder truth: AI is a powerful tool, not a plug-and-play savior. ROI timelines are stretching. Some projects are being quietly deprioritized or rightsized. The hype cycle is colliding with balance-sheet reality.

That doesn’t mean AI is a bust. Far from it. The companies that will win are the ones treating it as a long-term capability build rather than a quick-fix expense. They’re focusing on narrow, high-value use cases, investing in data quality, building human-AI collaboration models, and being honest about both the upside and the total cost of ownership.

The era of “just add AI” is ending. The era of thoughtful, disciplined AI adoption is beginning.
What are you seeing in your organization — genuine transformation or mounting costs? Curious to hear real experiences.

#AI #Leadership #BusinessStrategy #TechAdoption

Will the Board continue to increase the dividend in September, or keep it flat, now that the company is no longer part of the DJIA?

Maybe it is time to reinvest in 'the Network' instead of social justice warrior networks. Elon Musk solved the rural broadband issue, while this company bobbled the ball again.

Maybe they should keep increasing the dividend, as none of the strategy groups have come up with a single investment that has returned its cost of capital in more than a decade. See the stock price for details, should there be any doubters!

He is here to do a job (merge this company with Deutsch Telekom) and that has nothing to do with your best interests.

June 2026
The New Board Member
Last week — on June 19, 2026 — Centene quietly expanded its Board of Directors from 9 to 10 members, appointing Lauren M. Tyler. She comes from over two decades at JPMorgan Chase, where she held roles including Global Head of HR for Asset and Wealth Management, Global Firmwide Chief Auditor, and Global Head of Investor Relations. She also sits on the boards of Cencora and Guardian Life.
On paper, this looks like a routine governance move. But the timing tells a different story.
Tyler is landing on two specific committees: Audit and Compensation and Talent. The Compensation and Talent Committee is the committee that oversees workforce decisions and pay structures — the exact committee with oversight over something like, say, a Voluntary Separation Package going out company-wide.
The Context Nobody Is Saying Out Loud
Centene reported a loss of nearly $6.7 billion in 2025. Medicaid redeterminations have been chipping away at membership for the past two years. ACA subsidy uncertainty is real. And now, with the current administration's push to reduce federal Medicaid funding, the core of Centene's business model — which is roughly 70%+ Medicaid managed care — is under direct pressure.
The VSP is not a surprise. It is a logical first move when a company needs to reduce headcount costs without triggering the optics of hard layoffs. The question everyone should be asking is: what comes after the VSP if not enough people take it?
The Macro Picture
The health sector broadly is in a tough spot right now — and this isn't just a Centene problem. Managed care organizations that depend heavily on government-sponsored programs are caught between:
Federal Medicaid funding proposals that could significantly reduce reimbursement
Rising medical costs that squeezed margins across the industry in 2024–2025
A regulatory environment that is increasingly unpredictable
Centene has actually shown some improvement — they raised their 2026 earnings guidance after Q1 results came in better than expected, largely due to successfully wrestling down medical costs. So it's not all bad. But the workforce reduction is clearly part of that margin protection strategy.
What This Means for Employees
If you are weighing the VSP, here are the honest things to consider:
Evaluate the package terms carefully. Look at severance weeks per year of service, how long COBRA coverage extends, and whether unvested equity is being paid out. Don't just look at the headline cash number.
The job market for healthcare tech is still active. Skills in Go, Kubernetes, observability tools, and cloud infrastructure are in demand outside of managed care. Your experience doesn't disappear when you leave.
Waiting may not be safer. If VSP participation is lower than targets, involuntary reductions often follow. That changes your negotiating position significantly.
The board is tightening its grip, not loosening it. Bringing in a JPMorgan finance and HR veteran onto the Compensation committee right now is a signal about the direction of governance — not a signal that things are about to get more employee-friendly.
Final Thought
The people who built this company and kept it running through a $6.7 billion loss year deserve better than a rushed exit package. But the reality is that the strategic decisions being made right now are being made at the board level, not by your direct manager or even your VP.
If you can swing it financially, taking the VSP and controlling your own exit is better than waiting to see what comes next. If you can't swing it, start building your options now regardless.
Wishing all Centene employees the best — whatever you decide.
This article reflects publicly available information and personal observations. All financial figures sourced from Centene's public SEC filings and press releases.

My first move as pretend AT&T CEO would be pretty simple:

Stop chasing “transformational” nonsense and run the company like a telecom company. Wireless. Fiber. Business services. Network reliability. Customer service. Debt reduction. That’s it.

No media empire. No satellite TV fantasy. No “synergy” PowerPoint garbage. No paying billions for assets and then selling/spinning them off later at a loss.

The basic plan would be:

1. Aggressively pay down debt instead of trying to look clever.
2. Keep investing in fiber, because that actually fits AT&T’s core strengths.
3. Protect the network craft workforce, because contractors and outsourcing can save money short term but can wreck service quality.
4. Simplify management layers, because AT&T has always seemed ridiculously top-heavy.
5. Stop abusing loyal customers with confusing promotions that reward switchers more than longtime customers.
6. Make executive compensation depend on long-term debt reduction, free cash flow, network quality, and employee retention, not just stock-price optics.

And yeah, I’d probably cancel half the consultant contracts in the first week.

But the hostile takeover part might be tough. AT&T’s market cap is massive, and I’m currently a little light on the tens of billions needed to pull that off. Also, I suspect the board would object to my official turnaround slogan: “Stop Doing D-mb Sh*t.”

Two years to reshape the C-suite? Why wasn’t that done in year one?

Feels like another long, drawn out strategy instead of action. If it takes this long to make leadership changes, what does that say about fixing the real problems?

And let’s not pretend this is a new CEO walking into a mess. He was already there. If these are the people who needed to go, why did it take two years to figure that out?

At some point, you have to wonder if the problem is execution, not strategy.

So many missed potential sales with these Amazon returns. The dinosaurs in leadership stuck on old rent-to-own tactics trying to convert non rent-to-own people into customers instead of making our business meet their needs and earn their business. I've had success selling to these people and let's just say $.01 starts doesnt work. Averaging $140 in cod with these sales. It can be done. Need new fresh minds at the top. Stop holding us back!

There are so many strategy teams doing the same thing and then doing the work of other groups too. Then we have the external strategy groups doing the same thing. What’s the point?

How realistic is the target? Is there a portal that actively shows progress on this?

It was a fun ride while it lasted but time to go. I was on the Automation/Remainco side and don’t have faith in that team to set any sort of real strategy. (“Launch more NPIs” is not a strategy) For those sticking around, best of luck in the coming Hunger Games! I hope you like eating curry.

As we approach the midway point in 2026, nervousness is starting to set in for several employees in sales.

The narrative across the company is “We are not hitting our numbers.” Remember the numbers we are not hitting are those numbers set by the senior leaders. Senior leaders have far too often set unrealistic goals. The truth is our senior leaders should have seen the trends and adapted to them earlier but here we are sitting on the edge of our seats.

It’s time to rid the company of those individuals in sales that don’t speak with directly with customers. Running a branch of employees that only come on one or two days a week is not needed.

The days of clicking a button and watching the numbers grow are over.

Did you guys see SV’s presentation? He has figured out that physical AI technology of RemainCo is going to change the world and shoot this company to the top. Much as his career has taken off in last 30 years with only PowerPoint slides, without ever getting his hands dirty with any tech project.
Also with UOP taking over HPS management, it’s star is going to shine. Two years ago UOP took over Solstice AM management just for four months before they spun it out and the latter’s stock price has doubled in just 6 months.

This is from 1999 when we saw share prices drop by 24 percent just wondered if they dusted this off from an old set of meeting minutes..it feel awful familiar.

"In April, Thoman unveiled a plan to remake Xerox’s image as a technology company instead of a copier maker. The shift, which involves realigning the sales force, is designed to let Xerox sell customized packages of consulting services, software and machines that the company says will generate half its revenue in the next decade."

Guyana the poster child for operational excellence is starting to show some signs of depletion and sand/water production. Maintaining an FPSO above 260,000 bopd for over 6 months is looking like an improbability. By September Exxon will have to purchase another company with substantial production and reserves. Who do you expect it to be?

It's easy to focus on quarterly headlines. Harder to ignore a 46%+ loss in market value over 12 months. Don't forget the big picture.

Is it prudent to permit a BL favorite and boosted sycophant the opportunity to repair a broken organizational structure? BP is complex by design and by intent. Creative ideas and processes that are successful at other operating companies are frowned upon and sabotaged from the get go. Yet other operating companies that manage ex BP assets do so at a profit and discover and exploit the uplift left behind by people like GB

Just floating around with the tide and no destination. They could have been something if they bought up companies and simply just left them alone. The hubris of strategy, synergies, and merger integration....SBC RBOC boys from Texas. They were block head hammers and everything was a nail. Saw it first hand with the Cingular tie up. SBC heads for the most part were belligerent bulldozers.

As the following article concludes, Oracle has debt obligations around a quarter of a billion dollars.

What is the interest on that amount?
Does everything have to happen perfectly for 15 years to pay that off?
What is plan B?

https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/oracle-debt-fever-only-prescription-140741343.html

According to reporting today, Centene offered voluntary buyouts to most employees and indicated layoffs could follow if enough employees don't accept. CEO Sarah London told employees, "When our membership shifts, we need to shift our organization accordingly." The company reportedly had about 61,000 employees in Q1 2026. (Bloomberg Law)

## Updated Timeline

### Phase 1: 2022–2024

New leadership takes over.

Board thesis:

• Modernize Centene
• Become more technology-driven
• Improve member outcomes
• Diversify beyond traditional Medicaid dependence

At this point, the strategy was defensible.

### Phase 2: 2024–2025

Warning signs emerge.

Management faced:

• Medicaid redeterminations
• Rising utilization
• ACA Marketplace volatility
• Expiring enhanced subsidies

This is where forecasting and scenario planning become critical.

### Phase 3: 2025–2026

The strategy begins unraveling.

What happened:

Membership

• Medicaid enrollment declines.
• ACA Marketplace enrollment drops far more than originally anticipated after subsidy changes and premium increases. Centene expected ACA membership to fall from roughly 5.5 million to about 3.5 million after repricing. (Healthcare Dive)

Financials

• Massive earnings deterioration.
• Guidance credibility damaged.
• Investor confidence weakened. (Healthcare Dive)

Organization

• Executive restructuring announced in April 2026. (Investor Relations | Centene Corporation)
• Now voluntary buyouts and potential layoffs announced in June 2026. (Bloomberg Law)

# The New Insight

The buyout program is not the problem.

It is evidence of the problem.

When a payer begins broad voluntary separation programs after:

• Membership losses
• Earnings deterioration
• Multiple prior layoffs
• Organizational restructuring

it usually means management now believes the revenue base has permanently reset lower than previously expected. (Bloomberg Law)

In other words:

They are no longer planning for a temporary disruption.

They are resizing the company for a smaller future membership base.

That is a much more significant signal than the layoffs themselves.

# What This Says About Leadership

My view now:

## CFO Accountability: 40%

The CFO owns:

• Forecasting
• Scenario modeling
• Guidance
• Financial planning

The Marketplace membership collapse should have been modeled more aggressively.

Questions a board should ask:

• What was the expected subsidy expiration impact?
• What was the worst-case scenario?
• Why were forecasts so far off?
• Why did guidance have to be revised?

Those are CFO questions.

## CEO Accountability: 60%

The CEO owns:

### Strategic Direction

The critical decision wasn't the forecast.

The critical decision was:

"Marketplace will offset Medicaid losses."

That appears increasingly incorrect.

The company effectively:

• Lost Medicaid members
• Lost Marketplace members
• Lost operating leverage

And now must shrink the workforce to match the new reality. (Bloomberg Law)

That's fundamentally a strategic issue.

# What Would a Board Likely Do?

If I were sitting on the board today, I would ask:

### Question 1

Was this primarily:

• a forecasting failure?

or

• a strategy failure?

The answer determines who goes.

### If Forecasting Failed

Replace:

• CFO
• Chief Actuary
• Finance leadership

Retain CEO.

### If Strategy Failed

Replace:

• CEO

Possibly retain CFO if forecasts reflected the risks and leadership ignored them.

# My Assessment Today

With everything now known:

1. Medicaid losses
2. Marketplace losses
3. Subsidy expiration effects
4. Pricing issues
5. Guidance issues
6. Workforce reductions
7. Voluntary buyouts

I no longer see this as primarily a finance problem.

I see it as a strategy and execution problem.

The workforce reduction announcement is especially important because it demonstrates leadership is now reacting to membership losses rather than benefiting from a growth strategy. (Bloomberg Law)

# If This Were My Board Recommendation

Near term (next 6 months)

• Replace or restructure portions of Finance and Actuarial leadership.
• Bring in an external operating advisor with deep Medicaid and payer turnaround experience.
• Require a comprehensive membership recovery and profitability plan.

Medium term (next 12 months)

If:

• Membership stabilizes,
• Margins recover,
• Workforce reductions achieve targets,

then the CEO survives.

If:

• ACA membership continues declining,
• Medicaid pressure persists,
• Another major earnings miss occurs,

then I would expect the board to seriously evaluate replacing the CEO.

## Final Assessment

Looking at Centene from before Sarah through today, the company appears to have moved from a highly disciplined Medicaid operator under Michael Neidorff to a company attempting a broader transformation under Sarah London. The challenge is that the transformation coincided with one of the most difficult payer environments in decades. The latest buyout program is a strong signal that leadership now believes the enrollment and revenue outlook is materially lower than previously expected, forcing the organization into another round of cost reductions. Based on the information available today, I would assign greater accountability to the CEO than the CFO because the root issue appears to be strategic positioning and market assumptions, not simply financial forecasting. (Bloomberg Law)

The entry barrier to inferencing is less compared to training and modeling side of AI . So competition will ki-l the dominant position soon. So the hyper scaler story CEO says will only have short life and company heading south

well ...

HPE is up 333%

DELL is up 3'300%

Funny when large $$$$ doesn't come with even a bit of common sense

https://www.wheresyoured.at/ai-is-slowing-down/

Their AI-first hiring freeze is just an excuse to keep employee numbers, and costs, low. They have no AI strategy and by and large it's a game of showmanship and fakery.

Read that newsletter. It's fun and informative and he's got something coming up soon that should be a hoot.

Anyone with half a brain knows that Starlink is no longer just a rural internet fix. With 9.2 million paying customers ($10B in annual rev), and direct-to-cell satellites already working on standard smartphones, SpaceX is building a parallel network that bypasses carriers like ours entirely. Oppenheimer recently flagged it as a threat to the entire $1.6 trillion US communications industry. Legacy carriers spent decades owning and building the costly infrastructure. SpaceX just launched its own.

SpaceX is going scotch earthed and VZ will be roadkill!

It’s been over 1.5 years since COP purchased MRO and the question is- was it worth it? What were the positives and negatives? Is COP stronger and more agile now? What’s next?

I’m waiting to see what happens after the layoffs. Layoffs always cause a stock bump. The announcement of a multiyear layoff, while tragic, was smart for a sustained climbing stock bump but what about after?

You have to have something new that your competitor does not or do something better than your competitor. I’ve never seen a Citi bank, an actual walk in bank and I’ve never seen a Citi ATM other than what’s at the office. So we make the direction of wealth management. Oookay, so what’s our plan of getting that market share? People don’t just move money from a well established bank to another bank because they are bored with nothing to do.

What’s the plan to still have the stock grow post the layoffs? What are we doing to accomplish that, that’s either new or better than other banks?

We know CVX moves in lockstep with XOM but after the fact and a little slower.
What will CVX do to keep up with XOM?

Apache is going ba--s deep in Alaska a storied and complex oil province. Does this make sense? Will we see a repetition of Apache Canada with an eventual exit?
What’s JC’s plan?

https://www.spglobal.com/ratings/en/regulatory/article/-/view/type/HTML/id/3579174

With headlines buzzing about SpaceX and other high-profile private companies, it is tempting to rethink how we invest for retirement. But should that excitement push you to self-manage your 401(k)?

For most investors, 401(k) plans are built around long-term stability, not chasing hype. Broad index funds remain a reliable foundation because they spread risk and track overall market growth. While standout companies can capture attention, they are often inaccessible or highly speculative, especially in retirement accounts.

Self-managing your 401(k) can offer more control, but it also demands discipline, research, and a clear strategy. The real question is not whether a company like SpaceX is exciting—it is whether shifting away from diversified investing improves your long-term outcomes.

Before making changes, consider whether your motivation is strategy or simply reacting to market buzz.

What is this collaboration with the clothing brand, Municipal? I'm failing to understand the strategy behind this.

I’ve been here long enough to notice how often the company seems to shift based on the latest trend. Some trends fade fast, while others stick around much longer, and I don’t think we always know which is which. I wish leadership would think further ahead instead of treating every new moment like the whole strategy.

Anyone remember how beneficial BCG' analysis was to Ford' meteoric rise to profitability in the past?
Not!
I just want to hear stories from the older crew.
On another note, does anyone remember their attempt at implementing a Matrix Management model?
Maybe if they understood the difference between producing a quality product and the stylish management trends of the month, Ford would be a great car company.

https://seekingalpha.com/news/4601923-activist-jana-wants-fiserv-to-sell-more-assets-refresh-board---report

We lack vision and long term planning. We opt for layoffs because it's the easiest option to free up capital when our stock is going down the drain. We forget that the employees that we let go have context and knowledge domain expertise. By the time we realize, we're going to try and patch it up with rehiring but getting ramped up and onboarding takes time. At the end of it, we would have lost capital, opportunity cost and market share. I genuinely want to know who is driving our transformation and strategy? Are there not any business case studies we can look at? How many companies have successfully pivoted away from third-parties to DTC? Even Apple sells their products at other stores. How many companies have succeeded in GC? For a company of this caliber, I would have expected that we have some risk-based assessment when making these plans. I'm sure Nike would have its own Harvard business case study one day at this point.

@kp+1krea8g33 hits the nail on the head.

ConocoPhillips had extensive and profitable operations in Venezuela. With the country’s expressed interest that oil operators return will ConocoPhillips return and use its technical acumen with horizontal wells and frac technology to deliver exceptional results in Venezuela?

FDS seems to want to give the impression that they’re investing in real-time. What’s the strategic thought process there, seen the fact that it requires substantial investment to set up. It seems an odd choice when you’re already struggling.

Dan here. Announcing our 2026 strategy: We’re looking to globally engage end to end catalyst for change by intrinsically productizing cross-cultural channels and competently expediting seamless alignments. Artificial Intelligence. We want to rapidly create advanced dynamic customer experiences and compellingly scale user centric stories. Artificial intelligence. We’re going to be uniquely targeting low risk, yet high yield web readiness. Our exploratory research points to deconstructive relative contingencies, and now is the time to revamp and reboot our holistic asset projections, with our interactive 3rd generation paradigm shifts. Artificial intelligence. I’m sure we can make a window here to really discuss with our customers holistic, monitored innovations. Artificial intelligence.
And now’s the time to chart this opportunity and take the company forward. By now, you should be clear on the vision and purpose of the business. With this strategy and artificial intelligence, we will increase our targets 10x. Play to win. Artificial intelligence. All gas, no brakes. Artificial intelligence. Go team. AI.

I genuinely want to understand what's going on with CDO. She regularly brings sales people to speak at her town halls, the CEO directs AI roadmap questions to her instead of the product engineering leader, and right before the new CEO takes over she picks up yet another business unit. She came in as a operations leader, but now it feels like every strategically important BU reports into her.
At what point do we stop viewing this as a series of unrelated decisions and start seeing it as a deliberate concentration of leadership? Is the company effectively positioning her as the executive responsible for product, strategy, operations, and business execution all at once?
It's starting to look less like a traditional functional leader and more like someone accumulating power across the company, leading to a centralized executive structure similar to what existed under Mark's leadership, where significant influence and decision-making authority was concentrated under a single leader.
Time will tell whether this is the right approach. But given the company's experience with one man leadership, it's fair to question whether we're heading down a familiar path.

So are we all just going to nod along, or is somebody going to ask the obvious questions like, "What's the strategy again?" and "When exactly are we planning to factor human capital into it?"

PEP stock is sitting right in the middle of 2021's range - well below 2021's year-end close of ~$159 - Can doomed PepsiCo turn things around? How much Ramon has left in the role? Is this a real business value of our Strategy & Transformation over the last 5 years?