Retail giant Walmart is eliminating around 300 jobs in the Information Systems Division (ISD) during its re-organization of the Walmart U.S. technology division.
Insiders told Talk Business & Politics-Northwest Arkansas Business Journal that the retailer is laying off about 10 percent of its ISD workforce in Bentonville over the next few days. The layoffs started on Tuesday (April 4) and will likely continue through the month.
Impacted employees said they received an email asking them to report to a training room on Tuesday where they were told their jobs were being eliminated in the company’s efforts to restructure. The layoffs appear to be across-the-board and include officers. Walmart corporate spokesman Randy Hargrove told Talk Business & Politics-Northwest Arkansas Business Journal that the company didn’t target older or longer-term employees – as was often suggested on social media – but the cuts were based on the company’s ongoing efforts to streamline operations.
“As we said in January, to fuel our growth and our investments we have to manage our costs and our capital decisions with discipline,” Hargrove said on Wednesday (April 5). “This means we will continue to find ways to operate more efficiently and effectively, true to our cost-conscious heritage. In order to achieve this, from time to time you’ll see the company eliminate positions in an effort to stay lean and fast. In some areas, we’ll invest in new positions but in other cases, we’ll operate more efficiently and work to change our processes and become more digital to change the work itself.”
Impacted employees said they will stay on the payroll for 60 days and may apply for other positions within the company. After the 60 days, employees who have not found other jobs will be provided a severance package.
Insiders told Talk Business & Politics-Northwest Arkansas Business Journal that within the ISD division, the project management team took the biggest hit. Other jobs are being outsourced to a third-party vendor based in India which already does business with Walmart ISD. Still other jobs are being reduced from full-time to part-time and posted as temporary positions.
“Outsourced/offshored that you’ve been told is not correct … Also, if anything, our focus is on having a higher ratio of full-time associates doing actual engineering and software development, which gets back to the point I mentioned about looking at the business and investing in areas as necessary,” Hargrove said.
Walmart U.S. eCommerce CEO Marc Lore announced a restructuring of the division on Jan. 31, which impacted around 200 division jobs. The jobs cut this week are on top of that announcement, and they are in addition to the 1,000 corporate jobs slashed by the retailer prior to Jan. 31.
At the time of the corporate cuts, Wal-Mart Stores CEO Doug McMillon said, “To deliver the changes we ultimately want customers to see on the outside, we have to change on the inside. We need more speed and less bureaucracy. We need lower costs.”
Sam’s Club is also streamlining its home office personnel with meetings being held Wednesday and Thursday (April 6). All of the company’s club auditor positions were eliminated this week.
To read about the job cuts on Talk Business & Politics website, click here.
