Cisco's new CEO issues another warning about his plans to change the company

The company tells us that within the next two weeks he will announce his full new leadership team and he hinted there will not be as many leaders as there once were: voice gateways cisco

In a blog post, Robbins wrote (emphasis ours): 

As I transition to the role of CEO, my focus areas are acceleration, simplification, operational rigor and culture.

Going forward, we will move to a flatter leadership team designed for the speed, innovation and execution that is required of us over the next decade.

The bigger question on employees' minds: Are the company's annual layoffs and restructuring over?

We don't know. But by looking at the language, we won't be surprised if Cisco announces either another layoff, or if its new CEO talks about another re-org.

That's because Robbins' reference to a "flatter leadership team" is the second such warning about org changes he's given since he was promoted to CEO last month.

Last month, when Cisco announced his promotion, Robbins told outgoing CEO John Chambers that his administration is "going to make sure we drive a level of operational rigor that maybe is even a little tougher than what you did, John."

On a later conference call he talked about "doubling down" on "operational rigor."

Cisco employees

(Cisco) Cisco employees

We may have to until August find out exactly what he means by this.

That's when Cisco has traditionally announced any large-scale layoffs, along with its annual financial results. (Cisco's fiscal year ends in July.)

For the previous four years in a row, starting in 2011, Cisco announced layoffs.

All told, Cisco eliminated about 18,000 jobs between 2011 and 2014. But with acquisitions and hiring, Cisco ended its fiscal 2014 workforce with only 1,000 fewer employees than it had in fiscal 2013, the company said. It employs about 70,000 people worldwide.

Chambers told us in an interview last summer that he doesn't have "the heart" to trim the workforce like he should.