Workers will have to train their foreign replacements.
By Sujeet Rajan
NEW YORK: In perhaps the first of its kind, a group of 25 EmblemHealth IT employees and their supporters held a protest in the streets of Manhattan over the firm’s decision to shift work to IT services firm Cognizant, last month. A public protest is unique, as usually laid off workers rarely speak out immediately for fear of losing severance packages.
On the sidewalks next to EmblemHealth’s midtown offices, outside St. Michael’s Church on 34th Street near 9th Avenue, they yelled “Protect U.S. jobs,” “Keep jobs in the U.S.A.” and, to the people passing by: “It’s our jobs now, your jobs next.” They waved signs and slowly moved along, reported ComputerWorld.
IT employees faced with job loss over outsourcing usually keep their anger in the background. But the EmblemHealth employees feel betrayed, and misled by management, said the report.
One IT employee said the feeling is that the technical staff is being made to suffer because of bad decision making by the firm’s management.
“Why did they keep all the upper management?” this employee asked. “You kept the people who sunk the ship.”
EmblemHealth CEO Karen Ignagni told employees that “several hundred” IT and operations workers will be laid off as a result of a decision to hire services firm Cognizant. Labor attorney Sara Blackwell, who helped to organize the protest, posted the video on YouTube.
The picture that Ignagni painted in the video is that the firm didn’t have the money or the staff to modernize and automate its IT platform, a claim the workers disagree with.
For those employees who are laid off and are rebadged to Cognizant, there’s no guarantee of a career, just a short-term job. One employee said he was offered a two-year contract with Cognizant, but in this contract Cognizant has the right to relocate him to another site. He has children and can’t afford to take a position that might require a very long commute, reported Computerworld.
One IT employee felt lied to by the company. Even as it was negotiating a contract with Cognizant, employees were told by the CEO to “hang in there” and told things would improve. The goal, this employee said, was to encourage employees not to abandon the firm.
The website protectUSworkers.org had tis update, with the headline ‘Sorry EmblemHealth’.
“It is an awful day for hundreds and hundreds of EmblemHealth employees in New York. They were notified that the contract with Cognizant was signed. We did not stop it. They are being fired in 90 days. Before they are fired they will have to train their foreign replacements. In fact, some are already training their foreign replacements. The customers’ data is going to be accessible in India and other foreign countries.
The employees are completely distraught. EmblemHealth’s millionaire CEO KAREN IGNAGNI stated in a video to the employees that she is sad that the employees have to be fired but it is best for the company. The company needed innovation which apparently could not be done by Americans. The millionaire CEO KAREN IGNAGNI is not losing one penny of her salary to help the company; she is just throwing away her loyal and trustworthy American workers instead.
Goodbye America……”
The issue of H-1B visas has been discussed during the presidential campaign, but with Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton emerging as the likely nominees to contest the November elections, the issue remains deadlocked.
Trump has said repeatedly that he is in favor of legal immigrants, especially international students and skilled workers. Trump has made it clear that he will protect the interests of the American workers, though it’s anybody’s guess how he will achieve that with strong temporary guest worker programs intact for skilled and unskilled workers.
Clinton has not opposed the H-1B visas. The chief detractor of the program, Sen. Ted Cruz, is seemingly on his way out of the race, after the Indiana polls tomorrow.
2 Comments
They just announced they are outsourcing all claims processing to India as well. Goodbye privacy. Per the General Accounting Office approximately 40% of the companies that outsource claims have had security breaches. Good move EH
Congnizent, Tcs , wipro, infosys, tech mahindra these are the companies making lot of money cheating people of america..