Don't Just Cut Staff - Cut Work Instead
Don't just cut labor – you have to cut the work first.
Employees today are already overworked. They have trouble keeping up with the amount of work they have. It’s already hard enough for them to ensure the quality of service or product you provide in the time they have. If management, often new management, decides to save money by cutting labor, in effect, forcing their company to provide the same service and products but now with fewer employees, then they are simply inviting disaster.
If you cut staff without reducing workload first, something in your operation will break.
Employees will be forced to prioritise and choose the tasks and services they can complete and drop the ones that there will be no time left to complete. Hidden operating problems will multiply until something happens and they bring down the whole company.
To save money, you have to reduce the amount of work first.
To save money by cutting jobs, you have to either cut out some services or products provided, cut the quality you provide or find a better way of reducing workloads. The better way to reduce workload is to reduce the amount of time it takes to do each task or service.
Same work done in less time, but with the same quality = smart work = higher profitability.
Smart work is developed by examining the current work, identifying and eliminating obstacles, then reorganizing what is left.