DEC had an explicit &quot;never fire anyone if you can possibly avoid it&quot; culture.<p>There were no significant lay-offs until the last few years.<p>You might think that&#x27;s insane, but it created a lot of loyalty. And I&#x27;m not sure it&#x27;s any less sane than the current religion of cutting head counts at the first downturn in profitability, losing all the good people (because they&#x27;ll be the first through the exits), and crushing the morale of the rest - never mind other popular stupidities like off-shoring to countries that don&#x27;t speak English, or hiring back fired employees for vastly more money as contractors, because they&#x27;re the only ones who can make stuff work.<p>Meanwhile I keep wondering if MS should reinvent itself as a straight R&amp;D company. The research and blue sky side regularly does supercool stuff. The management, strategy, and customer satisfaction cadres - maybe not so great, actually.