I argue the design is unstable, from a different perspective.
Sure. But why wait for two years to ditch 10% of your workforce in one fell swoop when you can get rid of each problem employee on a case-by-case basis as the need arises over the years? Waiting for mass firing means disrupting your better employees longer than is necessary. If that's what's happening here, it still smacks of poor management to me. You've been employing dead weight for longer than necessary - dead weight should be removed constantly through the year, so instead of a headlining "x% jobs cut" you just have the typical hiring and firing cycle. The moment you have a large layoff like EA shedding 5% of workforce, it's hard to explain away from a logical POV. You might argue it's typical, but that points to a more endemic problem about how business operates that it really shouldn't be typical. Hire good workers as you go. Picked up a duffer? Let them go ASAP. As you hire more people, you grow the company, make more stuff, make more money, can afford your current staff and maybe add more. You should only be making big layoffs in response to a big market change impacting your revenue where you can't afford all the great staff you've been employing for years.
And it's worth nothing that the stories for most of these layoffs aren't saying it's dead weight at all but redirecting the company to adjust to a changing market. You're suggesting that stories like these are just smoke and mirrors to clear house?
Last edited: