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Dell Is Going Through a Layoff That You Won’t Notice

ByMike McBride Reading Time: 2 minutes

Before the pandemic, Dell had something of a hybrid or remote workforce. It wasn’t a problem. In 2021 and 2022, Michael Dell bragged about how well their remote workforce was doing. In 2023, Dell went through a round of layoffs despite still being a very profitable company. In 2024, they are still a very profitable company, though like many, not as profitable as they were in 21-22 because that’s the economy we live in, and suddenly, their stance on remote work has changed:

Dell workers can stay remote – but they’re not going to get promoted.

What changed? The company is making less profit than in 21-22. During that time, they had many people working remotely, so I don’t think that’s the problem. Inflation went up. People had less money to buy computers, and businesses had less money to invest in IT infrastructure.

So, now you want to cut expenses to improve your numbers in front of Wall Street without the bad publicity of another round of layoffs while still showing 20 billion dollars of profit per year.

That’s what this is about. The new hybrid rules will force out a certain number of employees—the ones who can’t or won’t move to another state to keep their jobs. If it doesn’t force enough of them out, well, you have identified the first ones you will lay off if it comes to it—the ones with no career growth ahead of them because they remained remote.

The fact that they’ve read headlines of other companies doing the same provides cover for them to force their employees to do something that has no impact on the company’s success.

If you’ve heard the term “quiet firing” recently, it means this. It is not directly cutting headcount but making it likely that some employees will leave due to your decisions.

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