Within the last 5-10 years, Disney outsourced entire technology divisions using the H1-B visa program and forced employees to train their replacements for their last 90 days or forgo severance.
A former Disney IT employee testified before Congress, at times crying while he recounted the experience of being let go and having to personally train his replacement.[0]
Whatever Walt Disney was doing back in the day doesn't seem to apply anymore, at least based on your description of what a successful creative company looks like. To me, this looks ruthless and manipulative.
It's a big source of revenue for Disney, but I don't know what their business calculus is. It would be very cool if they just walked away, it would be a huge loss for Florida.
I've heard similar stories from other Disney IT employees. It does seem like the tech coming out of the Research divisions continues to be extremely impressive though. Curious to get your thoughts on that.
I’ve heard the claim repeated by an Alcor employee. But they may have been repeating a myth. (Alcor definitely exists, and claims it chose Phoenix for the aforementioned reasons.)
I can see this happening, having worked with former Disney people (back office finance type stuff). Almost every day, "well at Disney we did it this way..." even years removed from there. Granted, sometimes the Disney Way was better! But other times I'd have to say, "that's not a bad idea, but unfortunately we don't yet have the resources or reputation of Disney to make a similar tactic work for this project."
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