There has always been a steady amount of people moving around in our industry but 2018 takes the cake. This year it was a frenzy of activity.
So what is the reason?
Some of it is the state of flux that the companies are in right now. There is a significant volume of M&A (mergers and acquisitions) coupled with digital transformation. Each company is trying to right size its product portfolio for the new economic landscape.
Take Verizon for instance. Amid its 5G roadmap and M&A around Yahoo and AOL, it is now set to shed 10,400 jobs!
Many CLECs have re-branded including Bullseye, TPX and Nitel – and some personnel changes were made. Channel Managers in the last 18 months have especially been jumping around.
In the channel manager space, I get that much of that movement is due to Quota and Take Home Pay. There is also this view that the grass will be greener over at one of the other 2000 providers.
I have to wonder about the hiring process. It obviously needs improvement.
One big issue I see is that people hire their pals. The minute Mr X hits Company A, he starts bringing in his pals. I’ve written this before but it bears saying again: “You didn’t hit it out of the park before, why would you bring the team with you?” The Yankees don’t hire a whole team; they hire A players to fill in a roster of A Players.
That’s a problem. So much of it is B or C players.
At least two clients put together an A Team in 2018. I watched another CLEC right-size itself by making good hires.
I have watched people get hired with a bunch of fanfare to flame out in less than a year. Reading one press release today, it is the art of BS. You can almost put a clock on how long this person will have the job.
There is a cost to this.
It is very expensive to play musical chairs for a company. The cost of hiring and re-hiring is one thing. The expense and time of training an employee to get up to speed. The lost opportunity cost.
There is a toll of morale and the culture. [This goes back to hiring. Are you hiring for a culture fit? Or are you just putting cogs into place? ]
The strategy of the provider suffers as well. Execution doesn’t happen. These fits and starts don’t pay off.
At the channel manager level, it disrupts continuity, deals, relationships, partners – and revenue.
Hopefully, 2019 means that some of this will slow down, but I have a feeling it will be another year of manic musical chairs as providers that can’t execute will suffer.
As I have explained to clients and folks at a workshop this week: The Big Guys – AT&T, Verizon, Spectrum, CenturyLink and Comcast – are very busy with integrations, M&A, debt portfolio management, 5G, chasing Netflix, and more. This is your window to win market segments. You have a runway to win business. Don’t fuck it up!