Today, the Department of Labor reported that first time jobless claims not only rose faster than expected but they were 72% higher than this time last year and reached levels not seen since October, 1982. With this news as a backdrop, it’s fortuitous that Marci Alboher, one of my favorite career experts, interviewed me in her new Working the New Economy blog on Yahoo! Shine for a post entitled “Negotiating an Alternative to a Layoff: 5 Questions for Cali Yost.”
Unfortunately, some layoffs are unavoidable. But if leaders considered flexible alternatives as part of downsizing, they would lower costs while retaining as much valuable talent as possible to work through this great recession.
As I determined which links from my blog to include in Marci’s interview, I realized how much I’d written over the past year laying out the business case for flexible downsizing. Since unemployment is a lagging indicator to a recovery, unless we change course, layoffs will likely continue at these historic levels. To inspire creative thinking on the part of organizational leaders and to support employees who want to present flexible cost-saving options to their manager, I’ve recapped in one place all of my posts related flexible downsizing as an alternative to layoffs–I hope the information provides some fact-based ammunition to reconsider job cuts as the only and best option, because they aren’t many cases… (Click here for links to the 20 blog posts)
Cali, I completely agree that flex arrangements are a strategic, viable alternative to wholesale layoffs. If companies look beyond the current downturn, this is a smart way to retain talent while cutting personnel expense in the long run. But how to crack into organizational leaders to get “creative thinking” going? Isn’t this the real problem?
The fragmentation of responsibility, the dominance of theoreticians in corporate strategy roles and the dramatic under-representation of women in decision-making roles, practically precludes any holistic decision making. These good ideas are out there but the companies that can recognize and embrace them are few and far between.