Scrooge actions of the day
Big Blue has
been dubbed the Scrooge of the technology world after cutting tea and coffee
from the office budget worldwide.
The move is supposed to save the company
cash and follows similar cuts which involved subsidizing employees' home
internet connections. Those workers who need a caffeine fix will have to buy
drinks from vending machines to be installed at "selected" company sites. So it
is possible that some workers will not get a cup of tea or coffee unless they
pop out for one.
But cutting a worker's coffee is probably the dumbest move
the bean counters could come up with. Workers who have not had their morning
espresso are either grumpy or sleepy, something which is not good for
coding. Besides already IBM has made its workers suffer to help push it
through the current economic crisis.
If you put in long hours of unpaid overtime
to help push the tech giant's profits up 12 per cent to $US4.4billion during its
final quarter of last year you need a cup of coffee to keep you going.
One
IBM employee told us that Big Blue was getting such a bunch of stooges they
would stick "a coin slot on the bog door" if it didn't cost too much to install.
"We are the ones saving the company and not these accountants, some of us
think that they are taking us for granted and are considering our options about
working elsewhere," Fudzilla was told.