posted
Layoffs. HR is calling people in my department one at a time and inviting them down to the HR department. Everytime someone's phone rings I cringe. I can't get anything done. I could very well get the axe today. Eight people are supposed to get laid off today, and so far I think 5 have been called down. Three to go. *stares at phone*
Posts: 5957 | Registered: Oct 2001
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I am a writer in my company's Creative department. There's about 40 people in the department. Eight got laid off, including my manager. Twenty percent, baby.
Man, I have a headache.
Posts: 5957 | Registered: Oct 2001
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posted
Our department director called a big meeting and assured us the layoffs were done, at least as far as our department was concerned.
The thing is, the company's doing really well. But they were trying to tighten the ship and reduce overhead. This wasn't a going-out-of-business bloodbath. Just part of the company priorities. Yergh.
Anyway, does anyone have any aspirin?
Posts: 5957 | Registered: Oct 2001
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posted
Well, that is a relief, afr! That you made it, and that it isn't downsizing due to failing business health. Still, it sucks to have layoffs. We've had...God, I think it's 8 rounds of layoffs in the past two and a half years. I did okay emotionally through the first several, but we hit round 5 or 6 and I started falling apart every time. Ours were due to limited operating capital and even more limited sales, though, so you shouldn't have to go through it over and over and over again.
I'm glad you made the cut.
Posts: 5948 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
My work has also had a few rounds of cuts.. I'm lucky to have made it through being in IT which is thought of has being mostly 'overhead'.
Now you get to look forward to the next bonus with these cuts...doing more work with less people for the same pay. I get to do the work that three people use to do. I'm beginning to feel very burnt out and stressed.
Posts: 512 | Registered: Jun 2002
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posted
littlemissattitude, while I understand your feelings, I can't completely agree. The first two rounds of layoffs in our company were pretty easy to get through...we did have to cut overhead due to limited cash flow, but we cut all our deadwood. Not a single valuable person got cut. Only the people who were marginal producers. When a company gets bloated, as ours did because we were owned be an absolutely enormous company who didn't care what we did or how much of their money we lost, you ought to cut just to keep the company on track and focused. Having too many people is still bad for a company, even if the company can afford to have them.
I personally liked almost all the people who got cut in our first two rounds of layoffs, and I hated to lose them as coworkers, just because I enjoyed their company. But it was telling when not a single one of them was missed.
Hopefully afr's company is using the cash savings to reinvest in the company's remaining workers and to secure the future of the company's well being.
Posts: 5948 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
I really hate to profit from the cuts. I doubt my position will change much, although I could be wrong. I won?t turn down a promotion if one comes. But I hate to think the company did this so the execs could profit or to temporarily drive up the stock price. I don?t think so. I?d like to think they have more integrity than that.
Thanks for the comfort and the codeine. All the survivors went to lunch together and my headache has abated some.
I don?t think they?ll do this very often here. People who have been here ten years or more only remember one or two very limited layoffs involving less than 20 people throughout the company. And they gave the laid off employees some pretty generous severance packages and some good professional help finding another job. They didn?t skimp as far as that goes. It?s a great company and a great culture. The fact that there were layoffs at all was a big surprise and blindsided everyone. Morale dipped for several months around here while the rumors floated around. Hopefully we can get back on track now and keep going.
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Chief executives of companies that had the largest layoffs and most underfunded pensions and that moved operations offshore to avoid U.S. taxes were rewarded with the biggest pay hikes in 2002, on average, a new report has found.
The study, released Monday by United for a Fair Economy in Boston and the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, used methodology that some companies criticized as misleading. Still, the report may add to the furor over executive pay.
Carol Bowie, director of governance research at the Investor Responsibility Research Center in Washington, said the study "demonstrates the flaws in how some incentive pay plans are constructed."
Many plans "are fairly short-term in nature and all of these things — layoffs, underfunded pensions and going offshore to avoid taxes — can pump up short-term results," Bowie said.
While the median CEO pay increase was 6% in 2002, median pay rocketed 44% for chiefs of the 50 companies that announced the biggest layoffs in 2001, according to the study.
At the 30 companies with the greatest shortfall in their employees' pension funds in 2002, CEOs that year made 59% more than the CEO median reported in BusinessWeek's annual executive compensation report, the study said.
Among the 24 companies with the most offshore subsidiaries in tax-haven countries, CEOs earned 87% more than the median pay for the last three years, the study concluded.
In the case of tax havens, CEO pay was measured over a longer time frame because the decision to use tax havens is considered a long-term move rather than a short-term step, said Chris Hartman, research director for United for a Fair Economy.
The group, founded in 1994, says its mission is to "focus public attention on economic inequality." The Institute for Policy Studies, founded in 1963, calls itself "an independent center for progressive research and education."
At the top of the study's list of companies that announced large layoffs in 2001 was Palo Alto-based Hewlett-Packard Co., which set plans to shave nearly 26,000 jobs that year.
In 2002, HP's CEO, Carly Fiorina, saw her pay rise 231% from 2001, to $4.1 million, the study said.
An HP spokeswoman "strongly disputed" the implied correlation, saying that Fiorina's base pay has remained constant. All employees, including the CEO, received a bonus in 2002 because the company met certain performance goals, the spokeswoman added. Fiorina turned down a merger-related bonus, she said.
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