GM opens fourth technology innovation center in Arizona (Phoenix, Chandler: 2014, houses)

[LynnHarris]

Hopefully this will attract interest from other major companies to open innovation centers in the metro-Phoenix area...


"General Motors Co. said Friday it has officially opened its fourth information technology innovation center in Chandler, Ariz., a suburb of Phoenix.

GM said about 500 people are employed at the facility and 25 percent of them are recent college graduates. GM wants to boost employment at the Chandler innovation center to a total of 1,000 over the next five years..."

From The Detroit News: GM opens fourth technology innovation center in Arizona | The Detroit News

[stevek64]

Good news! Thanks for sharing.

[Zippyman]

GM has a proud 100+ year history of throwing it's employees under the bus whenever times get hard. Those are great jobs for anyone just out of school to build experience & a resume, so you can get a job with a company that actually values it's employees, but don't plan on staying past the next downturn in the industry.

[grmi66]

Help design the lemon of the future.

[Nodpete]

Maybe this bunch of innovators will be able to come up with a GM car that doesn't get recalled. Naw, I'm just dreaming out loud !

[Zippyman]

Originally Posted by Nodpete

Maybe this bunch of innovators will be able to come up with a GM car that doesn't get recalled. Naw, I'm just dreaming out loud !

The I.T. initiative is to replace current "contract" I.T. workers with GM employees. It isn't about hiring "designers", as much of that is already farmed out to contract firms. In the 1980's GM fired, layed off, " right-sized" & "force retired" most of it's employee I.T. workforce & hired (or even re-hired as "contract workers") , most all of their I.T. workforce.

Companies like EDS hired I.T workers to work in GM facilities, maintaining, refreshing & updating GM's computers. It was a great deal for companies like EDS, because they often payed their employees 1/2 what GM did, but billed GM in excess of what "real" GM employees would have cost. GM was a darling in the stock market for a while for "downsizing" so many "overpaid" employees. The contract houses gradually turned the screws on GM & began drawing blood with their fees, shortly after the first "cost saving outsourcing" contract was signed. This is the myth of outsourcing "saving money" being exposed in real life. You're adding a middleman to the process, along with a whole new layer of management & beauracracy, and expecting costs to magically go down.

Now they want to cut out the middleman (contract house) & save money again, but GM has exposed itself over many decades as one that isn't particularly kind to it's employees when the chips are down. Ask any GM retiree, and understand that for every retiree out there, there are probably four or five people who worked for them for many years & got hosed repeatedly. Having spent far too many years in the industry & worked as a "contract worker" there myself, I can tell you that for me at least, they don't have enough money to get me to hitch my carriage to that horse again. There are far too many companies out there who don't have an allergy to good employees in bad times. There is no better example of "penny wise-pound foolish" than GM.