IBM Offering Jobs Abroad to Laid Off Workers

IBM employees being laid off in the United States and Canada are being offered a chance to take an new job in India, Nigeria, Russia or other countries.

Through a program dubbed Project Match, Big Blue will help interested workers “identify potential opportunities in growth markets and facilitate consideration by hiring managers in those markets.”

The company also will help with moving costs and provide visa assistance.

Other countries with IBM opportunities include Argentina, Brazil, China, Czech Republic, Hungary, Mexico, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Turkey, and United Arab Emirates.

Only “satisfactory performers” who are “willing to work on local terms and conditions” should pursue the jobs. IBM did not immediately confirm if it means that the workers would be paid local wages and would be subject to local labor laws.

A spokesperson for Alliance@IBM, a workers’ group affiliated with the Communications Workers of America, criticized the initiative.

“IBM not only is offshoring its work to low-cost countries, now IBM wants employees to offshore themselves,” spokesperson Lee Conrad said. “At a time of rising unemployment, IBM should be looking to keep both the work and the workers in the United States.”

Conrad said the Fortune 500 company has laid off more than 4,000 workers in the United States since the beginning of the year, but called that “a conservative number.”