(I found this message by Paul McGee to be quite worthy of consideration.)
If you had a fleet of a hundred cars but to save costs reduced them by twenty, what would you do with the remaining eighty?
Would you still service the cars and seek to maintain them? Of course you would.
It would be both stupid and short-sighted not to do so. But are organisations doing the same with their staff?
In times of cutbacks, austerity and lay-offs, have organisations decided to ignore the staff that remain and hope they’ll get by without any support?
Research suggests that’s a dangerous thing to do. Work done by Mika Kivimaki and colleagues measured the health of over 800 people before any rumor of downsizing took place, immediately after and then three years later. They then looked at which group of people – stayers, re-employed leavers and unemployed leavers – fared best in terms of health and psychological well-being.
It’s no surprise that the worst affected group were those who were laid off and became long-term unemployed. But here comes the surprise. The next hardest hit group were ‘the stayers’, particularly men, who fared significantly less well than the re-employed leavers.
So what are we doing for ‘the stayers’? What support are they receiving? What help are they being given to develop emotional resilience and the skills required not just to survive change but succeed through it?
In a short-term effort to cut costs, are we treating them like a car that we’ll run into the ground and not bother servicing?
You may save money that way. In the short-term anyway. But what about the emotional costs involved?
And how does such behaviour affect the long-term health and success of the organisation?
People certainly aren’t cars…they are immeasurably more valuable and important…. let’s make sure we have a service plan for our “stayers.” ~ Kirk Out
Mzsunflower's Say What? 