Looking Inward

For a good percentage of  the working class, the year 2009 has been about recession, layoffs and anxious moments to deal with. The HR strategies have evolved and organizations are making it a smoother and a less traumatic process for the employees in case of ‘layoffs’ or ‘long leaves’.

Personally, I have been in the HR circuit in the country and have heard of instances – good and bad – in this regard. But the other day, my old colleague from an IT company had a very different story to tell. It was different enough to blog about. This is his story of a manufacturing company located in the suburbs of Mumbai (India).

A fire alarm rang at 4 pm in the large office campus when almost all employees were present (approx 400 employees ).

As per the past fire-drill practices, the entire building was quickly evacuated and all employees gathered outside the complex waiting for further announcement.The HR officer in-charge made the following announcement to the group: “My dear colleagues : With sincere regret, I have been asked to announce that for many of you, this will be your last fire drill with us. Due to the on-going bad business climate, the company is laying off almost 20% of its staff. So when this announcement finishes, I ask all of you to move back into the building. And if your swipe-card does not work, then you know what it means! All your personal belongings can be collected by you within next five days.

The company is using this innovative, never-before approach as we do not want to choke our email system with  notices, farewell messages and abuse emails. We also wish to avoid any fighting inside the office and the consequent security issues for all staff.

We hope you have had a rewarding career with us. and good luck !

I really wanted to know the identity of the brainchild behind this. It turned out that this was just a humor catching fancy in the HR circuit!

Gosh! And we talk of sensitivities on issues like this!

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