A Mickey Mouse Move From Walt Disney

They were replaced with Indian workers here on H-1B visas. In order to receive their severance the displaced workers had to train their replacements!

Mickey_Mouse_normal“When you wish upon a star
Makes no difference who you are
Anything your heart desires
Will come to you”

Recently the Walt Disney Company wished for lower IT costs. Voila. Wish granted.

From Computerworld.com:

At the end of October, IT employees at Walt Disney Parks and Resorts were called one by one into conference rooms to receive notice of their layoffs. Multiple conference rooms had been set aside for this purpose, and in each room an executive read from a script informing the worker that their last day would be Jan. 30, 2015.

They were replaced with Indian workers here on H-1B visas. In order to receive their severance the displaced workers had to train their replacements!

Disney isn’t the only bad actor here.

From hreonline.com

Earlier this spring, a group of former employees filed suit against Southern California Edison charging the utility with abusing the H-1B program. The plaintiffs say they, too, were laid off and forced to train their replacements.

For years companies have been screaming for more H1-Bs. At the same time older workers have been screaming H-1Bs allow them to be replaced with cheaper workers from elsewhere.

This is not how H-1B is supposed to work.

From the NYTimes.com

According to federal guidelines, the visas are intended for foreigners with advanced science or computer skills to fill discrete positions when American workers with those skills cannot be found. Their use, the guidelines say, should not “adversely affect the wages and working conditions” of Americans. Because of legal loopholes, however, in practice, companies do not have to recruit American workers first or guarantee that Americans will not be displaced.

There’s a growing divide between what corporations want and what’s best for America. Disney and Southern California Edison might not care about their employees, but I do. This needs to be changed yesterday.

3 thoughts on “A Mickey Mouse Move From Walt Disney”

  1. This story actually hit the “Disney” investor and fan communities a while ago, but I’m glad this got some national press in recent weeks. This needs to stop. I don’t know why people don’t get more upset by this type of thing. I guess many people think “well, that’s just how it is today” but it doesn’t have to be like this. We don’t have to submit to every decision the one percent makes. They Disney PR machine has largely been silent on this one (wonder why), and no journalists seem to have the guts (or maybe just the access) to ask the tough questions here.

  2. It’s not like Disney can’t afford to treat their employees well. I really wish this would receive more publicity so the public can see that Disney is no better than WalMart….of course we won’t see it on ABC!!!

  3. Now you got me going. I trained my Indian replacements (yes, plural, it took more than one). I also answered their questions for years. I could go on and on about what it’s like to work in that environment but I won’t.

    But these companies aren’t the first. Just the latest. A whole lot of the entry level jobs in IT are now done by offshore workers instead of the recent college grad who used to do them. Companies no longer have a way to vet the future advanced employees because they don’t have the chance when they are entry level to see their capabilities for advancement. Pretty soon there won’t be any senior level IT staff that are from offshore because the ones we had will have retired and there are no new ones coming up behind us.

    And this is beginning to show in the leadership. They have to depend on outside consultants (including the offshore ones) to define how we would work as teams. One of the latest revelations? People need to talk to each other!

    Here in CT every time I hear that GE and Aetna are threatening to leave the state because of the increase of taxes (that they may not even pay) I grumble. If so many of our workers hadn’t been displaced by Offshore employees we’d have more people paying their share of taxes and be able to spread around the costs. Who offshored long ago? Places like GE and Aetna.

    So, I can truly say “Been there, done that”.

    Kate

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