Where to begin? [Here comes the wall of text!]
I left quite a while ago and waited until my resentment and exasperation had subsided before posting on Glassdoor. In reality, AMD/GF provided some great opportunities and experiences. I met some lifelong friends there. Then came the current Globalfoundries' mentality. GF was supposed to be "all the good stuff from AMD, but even better!" It has been an opportunity that has been completely squandered across what averages to a new CEO per year. A recipe for disaster from a leadership perspective. And 5 years later it still hasn't defined itself or decided what it wants to be and how it will get there.
First, this area of the country is so union-dominated that the profit potential of the Fab8 site is virtually zero for the next several years - if it ever succeeds at all. It is absolutely mind-boggling how much a simple task costs the company when done by union versus non-union. The exact same task by union folks, that could also be done non-union folks, costs between 3x and 10x what non-union projects cost! And we're talking a scale of Billions of dollars here. You do the math! Hey, I get it, it probably is nice to work in unions, but it is astronomically more expensive for the client, in a low-margin/high-investment business, with quality that almost never surpasses non-union labor outcomes. What is the benefit to the client? There really is none. It's bullying and intimidation, a lack of competition, inflated rates, and part of the package AMD/GF signed up for in order to get tax breaks and incentives to move to Malta. Way to think ahead, GF! It's purely a racket and most thinking people that are capable of being honest with themselves know this. And it is a primary factor for what I believe will result in a high-potential, but zero-profit company that will no doubt be sold in the mid or long term anyway.
Second comes the Human Resources team. This HR group is FAR too overreaching and is easily the most self-centered, self-aggrandizing group of management boot-kissers I have ever encountered in my 50 years. They involve themselves in so many operational decisions, without the technical experience, skill-set, or perspective to be anything less than utterly disruptive. Their inane excuses, processes, and procedures don't add up and they ooze a thinly-veiled contempt for the average employee. Just look at how many people on Glassdoor have called out Human Resources DIRECTLY as a major, insurmountable obstacle to success, not only for individuals, but for the company in its entirety. In a token manner, they solicit feedback that they ignore or, worse yet, turn around to bludgeon the masses with. They seem to actually believe most employees are so unintelligent that they don’t see what HR is doing. I guess employees are not smart enough or capable enough of understanding just how important HR is, at least in HR's mind. If that were the case, why have so many senior and talented individuals left the company? HR's attitude that they are doing the employees all a favor by 'allowing' them to work there is laughable and insulting. Let’s talk talent and performance assessments and reviews. GF's employee performance system is terrible. Just because Microsoft used to evaluate people this way does NOT mean it is effective or ethical. You have stellar performers being knocked down to a '1' or '2' simply because the bell curve demands that someone be at the bottom. HR, have you told your employees that the model you built your employee performance appraisals on was the model Microsoft used for 20 years and that Microsoft disbanded and discontinued this concept over a year ago because it was deemed unfair and outdated? Read Josh Bersin’s piece in Forbes on 2/19/2014 and you’ll understand why. He writes, and rightly so: “Research shows that this statistical model [Bell Curve], while easy to understand, does not accurately reflect the way people perform. As a result, HR departments and business leaders inadvertently create agonizing problems with employee performance and happiness.” So what does GF do? Uses this model exclusively. Classic GF! It has heavily contributed to GF’s loss of many, many other seasoned professionals in the last 5 years who refused to stay in an environment where luck, favoritism, and outdated performance models=‘high performance’. HR, you're a MASSIVE part of the problem. Get out of the way. Get re-trained. Re-educate yourselves for real-world HR application. Get re-staffed. Don't fool yourselves into thinking you've been right, fair, just, or a positive force for long term GF success. And above all, GET OVER YOURSELVES and quit being adversarial to the employees. You’re the least trusted group in the entire entity for a reason.
Third is Sr. Management. It's easy to dismiss so many comments here as coming from pettiness or spite. But look at the sheer numbers of people repeating the same story. Favoritism. Bullying. Intimidation. Disrespect. Refusal to bridge the culture and operations gaps between Germany, USA, and Singapore. Lack of caring about this or any of the 200 comments on Glassdoor. It's all right in front of their eyes. ATIC/Mubadala may very well be refusing to allow the management to make changes, increase salaries, increase respect...I honestly don't know. But if that is the case, at least be honest. At least be transparent. This wouldn't be the first group of managers that are beholden to investors and shareholders to the point they tossed out ethics and respect for others in an attempt to "get while the gettin's good”.
Lastly is management's ever-present apathy to make hard decisions that effect positive change. Oh, they talk a great game. But everyone is out to preserve themselves and that is the only transparent scenario you'll find at GF. Management out of greed or ambition. Middle-management out of frustration. Rank and file out of fear and survival instincts during a lack-luster economy, with a high cost of living, in the second highest taxing state in the U.S. When the CFO speaks to 150 managers about austerity measures and cost-cutting, then walks outside of the Cafeteria into a chauffeured limo (we all saw this), it doesn’t ring true that they care. When travel budgets are slashed, benefits restructured, new employee requisitions canceled (or stolen by other managers), and employees are asked to dig deeper for savings, but when the Sr. Management team goes on a multi-day “team building” exercise at an expensive resort. It doesn’t ring true.
GF, you’ll always breed contempt and disappointment with your lack of transparency, half-truths, refusal to heed known concepts of Organizational Psychology, failure to take your own medicine, placing too much power in your HR group, lack of cajones to stand up to your investors to get for the employees what they deserve, and on and on and on. But it really and truly is not too late to turn the ship around if ATIC will allow you to make tough decisions for the company, but right ones for the employee. In essence, employee satisfaction and loyalty can serve up success to you on a silver platter. Otherwise, it's gonna be gristle in a bowl for another 5 years.
I wish you all the very best of luck in trying to get profitable and stay that way. But even more, I wish Management at GF would read stories and statements such as mine and so many others - and ACT on it in a positive manner! Please don’t try to scratch your heads and claim you didn’t know things were this bad, as profitability never arrives and things cave in on themselves. Seriously. You (should) know better.
