JetUNsetter

I wonder some times about all these failed companies out there or even more so the unsuccessful but not yet failed companies out there. They do all the restructurings, the redundancies, the reorganisations, the desperate M&As. Lives are affected, economy is inevitably shrunk and those who are left behind in the troubled corporate obviously carry on full of worries, discouraged, stressed. Those with immediate options polish their CVs and focus on that path rather than the success and turnaround of the failing corporate. So the financials look better immediately and what? There are crazy people out there willing to invest good money in bad corporates?

It appears as though redundancies and restructurings are so common and so easy these days. Tech giants laid off hundreds of people post Covid and seems like the inevitable, the obvious even the right thing to do. But wait a minute! Who is accountable? Who made the wrong decision to hire these people in the first place only to let them go just a while later? Who structured the business in such a failed way that needs a restructuring now? What happened to that man or woman at the helm who made all the wrong decisions and then lives were affected? Those laid off for instance, will definitely read in the guidance available online that they should find a way to explain the gap in their CVs, not bad mouth the previous company and stay positive. Will the terrible CEO and led the boat to the rocks go through that agony? Is there a name and shame for that terrible CEO? Why can’t the employees simply say, well I was unlucky to find myself under terrible leadership so here I am, seeking a new job.

How about a regime where people who failed so miserably, are banned from being CEOs again? Instead, they seem to rely on their network and they will soon find another corporate to lead to the rocks…

Law? Where is justice in this analysis? Why is it acceptable to let people go to save a company? It should be legally imposed to be the last resort. Management teams go out first, bonuses to those with the power to define the financial position of the company are to be forgotten for a couple of years, all other measures are in place and lay offs are the last resort. Not only the last resort but even need to be supported by evidence that they were necessary, justified and will actually help bring the company back on track. What usually happens is that people are laid off but the job still needs to be done, obviously, and a carefully designed outsourcing scheme is in place.

Should the McKenzies and the Bains out there even dare to suggest a lay off? All these fees due for someone to suggest such an easy trick? That only yields a short lived relief?

And if the company is back on track? Shouldn’t they compensate those affected by the bad decisions? Even retrospectively?

At first glance, this easy way out of it seems very dangerous and irrational to me. Hope you can make me make sense of it….