Siemens ditches consultants Engineering behemoth Siemens is canning contracts with external management consultants in order to cut costs. Peter Löscher, chief exec of Siemens, told managers last month to cut contracts with external consultants as quickly as possible. Staff should use internal consultants or seek sign-off from the group's chief finance …
This is what UBS and other investment banks need to do - they are canning permanent staff to appease the stock market while still paying very high rates for contractors. Some contractors who have been there years are having their high rates renewed, not even re-negotiated, while permie staff next to them are being made redundant.
Well done Siemens. Next, we need the government not to renew HSMP visas.
I'm currently a consultant in a big international company. Thousands of permanent staff, but nobody with the skills to do a job i don't consider too complicated. I work alongside permies who, as far as I can see, have no evolutionary value at all. They don't seem to be able to do anything, especially anything well. Yet this company's HR is particularly good at shielding the incompetent from being flushed, while good permies walk. The managers hire 'faces that fit' and they aren't exactly burning rocket fuel either, so all I can see from where I sit is a sea of the mediocre, the jobsworth and the grossly incompetent. If they get rid of me, I can get another job, as I am good at what I do, so it's kinder to lose me than one of these others who wouldn't have a hope in hell out there in the cruel world.
Hah, they've been over-reliant on consultants for years, it'll be amusing to see if this changes anything for 'em. Heck, their UK intra-business IS team routinely used contractors as deskside technicians even though getting people in full time would have been significantly cheaper, not to mention the number of UK contractors they had working in Ireland for months on end who would be put up in executive suites during the week and flown home for the weekends...
Anon for obvious reasons...
Many companies suffer from consultantitis for a variety of reasons. A high level of consultants in a company indicates (to my mind at least) that there is either a lack of confidence in management or a lack of balls and ability in management. Which then begs the question "Why the f**k are the management there in the first place?".
As a very highly paid contractor I justify my time with organizations such as Siemens by pointing out that they only actually need 3-4 weeks of my time (in a year - maybe two), and the returns on my expertise are massive.
It's just that there is no point in having me around full time, and better still, when I work with other organisations I can share expertise. It works for all the companies my team help. They pay a great deal and they get a great deal - and of course they are not tied into our services.
Paris, because she knows all about great numbers.....
How can you hire external consultants (for whatever reason) and then ditch them (rather than anything else in your business) when money's tight? Just don't hire the consultants if you don't need them or don't hire your staff who may not be doing a job you need. Whatever makes sense in your business (I'm thinking that ditching the consultants whose expertise you currently need might not be it). You are capable of running a business aren't you?
This probably means that Siemens will try to offshore even more development to India. I have serious doubts that they will actually stop working with externals. Their announcement to ditch the consultants may seem like they plan to reduce costs by letting internal people do the work but that is not how they work. I have worked as a consultant for Siemens business Solutions for a few years and this is how they do most of their business:
The bid on almost any big project available, often with prices below market value to make sure they win it. They make a big deal about how they are a huge company focused on quality, ISO certified etc etc.
Once they DO get the the project they hired a bunch of external to do the project of pass (part of) the project to a small consultancy firm (like I was working in) who are happy to get a chance to work on a high profile project.
The client charge the customer X euro, keep half for themselves and the other half goes to the sub contractors which results in very slim margins for them.
The put 1 Siemens project manager on it who has at least 50 similar projects. This means that they will do as little as possible, do not expect them to do more than send 2 mails a week.
In the end I was really disgusted with their way of working and I am very happy that I am not working for them anymore. They just pass the buck to their subcontractors, whenever there was an issue or problem with the spec you would just give in to keep the client happy and the subcontractor would have to resolve it so it did not cost them a thing.
I am sure they will start working with externals again once the economy picks up because the make tons of money doing fuck all.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
