Brit retailer John Lewis to catapult 111 tech bods over to Capgemini weeks after dumping 244 on Wipro
- Reference: 1594801892
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/07/15/john_lewis_capgemini/
- Source link:
Having already [1]directed a herd of 244 Partners toward Wipro , it is now the turn of another 111 who will transfer to Capgemini under the Transfer of Undertakings Protection of Employment (TUPE) regulations.
The Register understands that of the 111, 80 former Partners could be made redundant. Fifteen roles will be created to support the relationship with Capgemini.
Other than confirming the 111 non-customer facing Partners heading to Capgemini under TUPE, John Lewis was unable to provide an exact number of potential redundancies in response to a question from The Register .
While the terms and conditions are under review, the spokesperson told us "some changes will be live from November and then fully completed by March 2021."
"Capgemini is proposing a new operating model where 111 non-customer facing Partners are expected to transfer to Capgemini under TUPE. Due to the formal nature of this process... we are unable, at this stage, to provide more exact information about the numbers or types of roles impacted on transfer," a spokesperson for John Lewis told us.
The agreement goes across both the grocery arm, Waitrose, and those working behind the scenes at the John Lewis department stores.
From the perspective of the John Lewis Partnership, Capgemini will be there to dole out IT application services and, perhaps more importantly, support the processes of a business somewhat buffeted by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Capgemini itself, however, insisted it would be the "the strategic application delivery partner" for the retailer.
Cap will also be helping the venerable UK retailer to "continue to delight its customers", although that could be tricky if a swathe of IT staff knowledgeable in the business are indeed for the chop.
John Lewis told us that a "thorough and comprehensive knowledge transfer process" would be undertaken before Capgemini formally takes over the service.
The Register understands that some expectation management might have been in play. While the number due to be slapped with the TUPE stick (if one includes the earlier Wipro announcement) is approaching 360, mutterings that as many as 500 employees could be hit were circulating within the bowels of the partnership earlier this year.
This is, apparently, the last announcement expected from the retailer as far as its IT operations are concerned. Then again, its new motto seems ever more like "never knowingly under-outsourced", so never say never.
Capgemini reported modest growth for the first quarter of 2020 as revenue climbed 3.1 per cent year on year to reach €3.547bn. The UK and Ireland part (making up 12 per cent of the group's revenues) reported a 2.6 per cent decrease at constant exchange rates. The total headcount stood at 219,100, up 2.9 per cent year-on-year, with a 2.4 per cent increase in employees in offshore centres to 124,900. ®
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[1] https://www.theregister.com/2020/07/01/the_john_lewis_partnership_wields/
[2] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Howdy Partner
I was under the impression that John Lewis had 'partners' not 'employees'. As in 'we all own the company and have a say in the running and the responsibility and share of the profits.'
I guess that all goes out the window when the takings are down.
Re: Howdy Partner
One of my friends use to do electrical maintenance for John Lewis, few years ago they got punted to a private company, "same contract".
Within 6 months most of his team had left due to shift changes, ever every 2 people who quit 1 would be hired. Before the turn of the year his patch was 5x larger than it was previously and he ended up off sick with stress.
This is a guy who prided himself on never being off work ill in 20+ years..
Re: Howdy Partner
Worked in JL 4 years ago. Let alone that there were already 2 companies, the old-timers, in middle-to-high managment, productivity close to zero and full privileges, and the newcomers, doing most of the actual heavy-lifting, and to all extend being marginally affected by the benefits scheme,(pension scheme changed at some point and was at best on-line with the market, versus the old scheme that was veeery generous), the so call "partnership" is a buzzword only used when bad news were presented...Missing the people, not the job.
Re: Howdy Partner
From what I've read then JL is taking the line that they are a shop selling to the public therefore the only people who need to be JL staff and have the JL "ethos" are the direct selling shop staff ... everyone else is just supplying a service to enable their shop staff to sell to the public and there's no reason why they should be employed directly by JL.
"(...)111 who will transfer to Capgemini under the Transfer of Undertakings Protection of Employment (TUPE) regulations.
The Register understands that of the 111, 80 former Partners could be made redundant."
Funny how the part about "protection of employment" doesn't seem to mean what it says...
"Funny how the part about "protection of employment" doesn't seem to mean what it says..."
Redundancy isn't always a bad thing
"Redundancy isn't always a bad thing"
I know someone who worked in part of JLP that was outsourced in recent years. All the senior management were told that as the JL job grades didn't match the new employers job grades at the top levels their posts would all be made redundant on day 1 of the transfer and they would be invite to apply for (a reduced number of) new jobs in the new company's grading structure .... or take redundancy. Since the redundancy was, I gather, done on the basis of JL historic practice (possibly this was a requirement of TUPE) then it was quite generous and the senior management most of whom had been at JL all their working lives were able to take the redundancy route with a couple of years salary as compensation - and in some cases knowing that in not long after that they'd be able to claim their JL pension which would restore all their partnership privileges and discounts etc.
Squrimy words, look at the detail
interesting that they are chopping and slicing between 2 outsourcers. Also interesting that 80 of those off to Cap are possibly offered redundancy while that isn't mentioned for Western India Palm Refined Oil.
Do they really think that they will be able to manage 2 outsourcers that will just blame each other for issues and up costs?
Cap appear to be offering the best deal to "Partners" here, as for the lifers redundancy could be a game changer.
John Lewis told us that a "thorough and comprehensive knowledge transfer process" would be undertaken before Capgemini formally takes over the service.
No. No it won't. Never has done, never will do. I have been through the 'KT' process more times than I care to count (both sides of the equation), and despite numerous attempts it just never seems to work.
On the one side, I have provided documentation, done live sessions, had people shadow me - only for the documentation to get 'lost', people leave, and the sessions no-one ever bothers to watch.
On the other, I have taken KT that turned out to be incorrect, outdated, or omitted as a requirement altogether. Some aspects of that caught in time (the "oh yeah, we forgot about that bit" syndrome), other aspects not caught until much later when something fails.
Poor sods...
First COVID then this.