While working in high IT, one can expect some long hours, stress, and seemingly ridiculous demands, the pink elephant in the room is the plain and simple fact that most, if not all non-China personnel are being systematically phased out. Although it hasn't been made public yet, by the time this post is approved, the world will know that Lenovo just cut another big chunk (about 300 people) of the U.S. workforce and will send most of that operation to China. This comes in yet another hasty reaction to a slowed financial forecast in the enterprise space and the fact that we moved far too slow in the smartphone and tablet space.
This company knows very little about real innovation, despite the ubiquitous "DO+" rhetoric that can be seen around campus... China wants everything for nothing, and doesn't understand that much of the world is realizing that quality and value is better than cheap and "good enough." This attitude will be this company's undoing.
Lenovo has been following and not leading for too long and trying to play catch up year after year. We, in the U.S., constantly have to prove ourselves to our Chinese leaders, despite achieving more than them with fewer people. We must work with colleagues from China but be careful on how we collaborate with them, since they will take our ideas and the credit for them in an instant, leaving our KPIs in the red and our jobs at risk.
There is absolutely no job growth here outside of China. I have seen so many new faces in the past few years hire in at higher bands than ever before. People at the lower bands work hard, struggle, then get fed up and leave. If you aren't part of the good ole boys club from IBM, you aren't going anywhere, and your job is at greater risk.If you can't keep up with the constant change of strategy and org charts, you will most likely be cut during the next layoff. Lenovo doesn't grow careers, it hires people to scratch an itch and then disposes of them when they are deemed no longer useful.
