Like one ex-colleague, I wonder what Nokia will look like when the economic dust settles. I’m told that the last remaining Irving (Dallas, Texas area) building is experiencing a sort of settling– dwindling employees are being shuffled swiftly downward as lower office space opens up, emptying the upper floors. My prediction of the site downsizing into a regional sales support office appears to be bearing out. Where else is this occurring? Offhand I don’t know… but I keep hearing that global roles are heavily impacted, which continues to confound me. Is this really signalling a retreat back to Finland?
I still see new openings in other areas, but I remain curious about the overall picture, i.e., what is the loss-to-gain ratio? When a company leaks employees here and there rather than laying them off wholesale, getting a picture of the headcount becomes difficult. I’m sure that’s by design in this case.
The question is, can Nokia execute well enough or are too many key employees being let go? The company now estimates that 2009 will see a 10% reduction in global handset sales. One could argue that such a drop necessitates an equivalent or at least proportional cut in headcount. But does that factor in the hoped-for area of growth, Internet services? The slow rollout and misfires of Ovi.com suggest that the venture suffers a resource issue of some sort. Is it fully staffed, or just running like a skunkworks project?
Tabula Crypticum 