Irony?
AT&T, the mother of all network and telecommunications companies is calling its teleworkers back to the cube farms.
“It’s crazy; I don’t understand it,” the employee says. “We’re a networking and communications company.”
Monolithic bureaucracy. When Ma Bell (AT&T) was broken up, in 1984, into seven Baby Bells a.k.a. Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOCs) the bureaucracy went with it (in some ways but not in all) and it was necessary for the RBOCs to become innovative. One of the ways that happened was the remaining AT&T invested heavily in tele-working for its employees. Not only did it sabe AT&T a lot of money on facilities they did not need to have but their teleworkers were more productive.
However no sooner was Ma Bell broken up than the separate parts started scheming on how to overthrow that breakup and bring Ma Bell back to life as a telecommunications monopoly (those of an age will remember when you could not buy any equipment to connect to a telephone network, including the telephones, from anyone other than AT&T.) Starting in 2005 a good portion of the original AT&T was brought back together with the purchase of the legacy AT&T by SBC Communications, followed by their purchase of Bell South and Cingular Wireless. Apparently the old telco headspace is rearing its ugly head again and everything must be tightly controlled.
This does not bode well in US networks for innovation. Couple this with AT&Ts attacks on people’s privacy through its co-operation with Bush’s illegal warrantless wiretaps and the revelation that AT&T was funneling the entire North American Internet data stream to the NSA, as well as their attacks on Net Neutrality and there is a lot if ill boding going on here.
Technorati Tags: telecommunications, AT&T, cube farm, telecommuting, teleworkers
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