I have NEVER witnessed the kind of opression that AT&T places on it's employees. Management treats you like dirt. MSOC is an extremely flawed philosphy where cheaters and liers are patted on the back, while hard working, honest techs are put on steps of discipline for being "unsatisfactory technicians". You go in every morning and get told how you are a disgrace and dissapointment to the company and should be working harder to be productive. You are not only fighting to maintain your numbers above an almost unobtainable bar, you are pitted against your co-workers.
Steps of discipline are handed out like candy. Micromanagement would be considered kind by AT&T's standards. It is more like nano-management. When you finally accept the new BS standard that is so "highly important", they go and throw another log on the fire. There is SOOOO many details and standards that you have to meet that it is hard to keep it straight. All it takes is one little slip up and you are on yet ANOTHER step of discipline! I think that my personal "best" was being on 7 different steps of discipline at one time.( All for extremely minor infractions that the company deemed SOOOOO important)
The biggest fallacy is efficiency. They want you to meet this extremely high standard that would be difficult under ideal conditions. Then, they throw all of these road blocks in your way to slow you down even further. We can no longer use our cell phones to converse with other groups. Now we have to chat with them on our lap tops.(or face being put on a step of discipline for being non-compliant) what used to take 5-10 minutes by phone now takes 20-30 minutes by lap top. This ,ay sound trivial until you realize that you ONLY get 52 minutes per job.(or, as you guessed it, face being put on a step of discipline for not being effiecient!) Now they are about to intorduce even MORE BS road blocks while ever raising the efficiency bar!
I started when it was still called Southwestern Bell. I loved it here and looked forward to some day retiring from here. It was a good place to work. Management was respectful of their employees and worked to aid us in doing our jobs better. Now, they exist to be the company whip! The use of fear and intimidation is their only mode of operation! Gone are the days when you could look forward to going to work and felt proud of the logo on your shirt.