The Rising Influence of Rising Affluence

[OakesCS]

i wouldnt just limit my comment to oil-field service companies. i've seen competent, productive people whacked and astoundingly incompetent (and dishonest) people retained in and outside of the oil industry (the stories i could tell you about the nuclear waste 'industry').

SLB just whacked 100s of 'advisors' who tend to be senior. As far as i can tell, practically everybody near 25 yrs of service was offered a retirement package. Some very sharp, long termers werent offered that consideration. I think they use an algorithm to determine whacking order for everyone else and the algorithm was designed by HR folks who like to 'assess' highschool or college GPAs without any other context. They also worry about things like physical location and it doesnt matter if the whacked person in Calgary is 5x more valuable than an 'equivalent' in Houston.