Redundancy
Strategies for redundancy
...the workforce is one
group of stakeholders amongst many, and within the free-market model of
capitalism they are probably the weakest. Presenting a caring image to
staff and the consuming public may have advantages but greater attention
is paid to more powerful voices when action is required. Directors and
financiers ensure that their interests are satisfied first - well before
those of the employees. This reflects a people-as-objects rather than a
people-as-people approach (hard v soft). (...)
Planning for redundancies
(...) Despite the emphasis
on job security as a prerequisite for an effective human resource strategy,
reality in free-market economies demands planning for redundancies. (...)
One currently fashionable euphemism for the process is 'deselection'. This
implies that some form of systematic or thought-out procedure has been
used to decide who will lose their jobs. (...)
Redundancy and retention
Managers in charge of redundancy
programmes typically focus on target numbers, with little or no thought
about the quality of the staff leaving the business. (...) An obsession
with numbers leads to a haemorrhaging of valuable skills: years of work
on building a strong competence base can be undone in a matter of weeks.
International organizations and redundancies
Redundancy is governed
by social legislation in most developed countries. The UK has some of the
least restrictive laws. (...) Businesses with operations in different countries
must take their respective severance rules into account. (...) Some organizations
may concentrate their redundancies in the country where severance costs
are lowest.
Managers and professionals
Redundancies
in the 1980s and 1990s have affected managers and professionals
more than ever before. Restructuring and delayering have meant redundancies
for many experienced people in their forties and fifties.(...)
Recently, critics have argued
that the cutting process has gone too far. Delayering or downsizing have
led to 'dumbsizing' - a condition described by Hamer as 'corporate anorexia'.
Organizations have slimmed down to the point where they are denuded of
the skills needed to grasp new opportunities and remaining staff are demoralized
and overworked.
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