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Typically layoffs are the result of FAILED management . Unfortunately, layoffs are common in large companies since there is a plethora of horrible management these days. Of course, the root problems don't get taken care of (the lousy upper management) its always the productive workers who are used as scapegoats.
Thats the private sector for you. I don't suggest it to anyone. When you're career/life are put in the hands of a short-sighted nimrod upper manager and they fail and you pay the price. its not a good situation to be in. Public sector is the only one safe way to go now. You don't lose your livelihood because some idiot is in a position he has NO BUSINESS being in.
My company has been in a "free-fall" these past 3 years due to horrible business decisions and the only ones who have paid the price are the workers.
Usually in any organization you have some who are poor performers. If you are the boss, dealing with them can suck up way too much time.
A layoff gives you an easy way to get rid of those folks with a minimum of drama.
Jack Welsh at GE was famous for implementing Darwinism within the organization. At GE, they would do 10% layoffs each year. That motivated the survivors to work harder.
Yep, that's what Jack said, but like so many of his lies it was far from the truth. It did a good job of destroying what was left of the survivors. Those that survived became aware that their job, company, and working conditions weren't what they were touted at their hiring and became lackluster employees, if they hung around for more than a month or two.
Jack and Jeff did a great job of trashing a once great company; they should both be in the CEO Hall of Shame.
My company seems to do reorganization every 2 years. sometimes its minor reorg where our task or title changes but no head count change. some times it is bigger reorg say every 5 years where headcount changes or we have to bid for our job and go thru interview position. I have been here 10 years and survived 6 reorg. somehow they find a place for me. It is the people who refuse to take any role they assign have the most problem
That said, in 2013 one human resources consultant estimated that 30% of Fortune 500 companies still used some sort of ranking system but often under a different name.[7] A 2013 survey by WorldatWork, however, showed that it was used by about 12% of U.S. companies,[8] whereas another by CEB in the same year found that it was used by 29% of companies.[9]
somewhere from 12% to 30% of companies seem to use this
so... 1/10 to 1/3, take your odds when you job hop around, because those odds over a dozen jobs don't look too good
So...how common is this? (note that I am in the finance industry)
It is the norm. Big companies layoff a lot of people each year. My friend work in a fortune 500 company. They just laid off a lot of people last week. But in his department, only his manager got laid off. He made too much money, six-figures. It is quite normal each year at around this time for that company to let people go.
My other friend also works for a big company. He works there for ten years now. So far he has survived because he is smart. He doesn't sit around waiting to get laid off. Whenever he senses something go wrong such as a sudden decrease in workload, he always put a request in to transfer to another department. He is lucky. All his previous departments he had worked are closed and all the people he had worked with are gone. There is a major layoff coming in next couple months. I don't know if he can survive that or not. You don't always get lucky. Soon or later, luck will run out.
It depends on the company. To generalize based on a companies size is unfair. While the big company might be a lot more reactionary to the quarterly earnings report and shareholder call, small companies can be even more volatile, or political...
It depends on the company. To generalize based on a companies size is unfair. While the big company might be a lot more reactionary to the quarterly earnings report and shareholder call, small companies can be even more volatile, or political...
Generally smaller companies have less jerks and idiots . The bigger the company the more corporate stooges you're dealing with where the ONLY thing that matters is short-term numbers and to hell with a year or two down the road. And most companies today all that matters is cutting expenses to look good in the short-term. But there are only so many expenses you can cut to make your numbers look good. Sooner or later, you have to PRODUCE something other than reducing headcount
i too work for a company over 50,000 employees and layoffs happen every few months or so in various departments. However this mainly because company not doing so great for a few years; historically it was a stable environment.
Typically the poor performers are "laid off". Basically I think every year large companies clean house and get rid of the bottom 5% of employees. They just call it a layoff when it is really a firing. I remember GE CEO jack Welch implemented something like this where they got rid of the bottom 10% performers in the company every year. So layoff is generally for people not bad enough to fire, but not good enough to keep.
Last edited by Berteau; 02-21-2018 at 03:52 PM..
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