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aside from the funny proper noun, how should things be handled differently? why do people think that corporations' primary goal should be to maintain employment

aside from the funny proper noun, how should things be handled differently? why do people think that corporations' primary goal should be to maintain employment of everyone in their company, that there's some sort of moral imperative to do so? is this just because social media has been pretending that corporations are people for so long now that we've forgot that they actually aren't?

adamesque 4y ago
I think people are increasingly uncomfortable seeing the price for strategic errors not being paid at all by the people responsible for those errors. It's tricky because I don't necessarily think the CEO should be fired, but it feels like the chain of accountability is broken.
bink 4y ago
This is a pretty cynical take on the idea of retaining qualified employees during a downturn. When I hear people talk about doing what you can to not have mass layoffs I don't think what they mean is that the company has an obligation to the employees that overrides their obligations to their shareholders. The way I read it is that people are saying that retaining good employees is beneficial to the company and the shareholders compared to the morale hit of a mass layoff. If companies are using mass layoffs to get rid of the "chaff", so to speak, then they have a management problem. Maybe all these companies performing mass layoffs do really have a management problem and hired way more than they should have. But if that's the case maybe the first step is to rectify the management problem rather than to layoff 10-20% of the staff. There really isn't a way that can be done smartly so that you retain the best people and don't destroy morale, effectively harming the shareholders in the long term.
- adamrezich 4y ago
  > the morale hit of a mass layoff. this is really hard to quantify, especially when it's increasingly becoming standard operating procedure across the industry.
- palunon 4y ago
  > When I hear people talk about doing what you can to not have mass layoffs I don't think what they mean is that the company has an obligation to the employees that overrides their obligations to their shareholders Depends on who's talking/the situation. When you hear people talking about not closing a profitable factory instead of laying people off to delocalize, that's pretty much what they mean.

adamesque 4y ago

I think people are increasingly uncomfortable seeing the price for strategic errors not being paid at all by the people responsible for those errors. It's tricky because I don't necessarily think the CEO should be fired, but it feels like the chain of accountability is broken.

bink 4y ago

This is a pretty cynical take on the idea of retaining qualified employees during a downturn. When I hear people talk about doing what you can to not have mass layoffs I don't think what they mean is that the company has an obligation to the employees that overrides their obligations to their shareholders. The way I read it is that people are saying that retaining good employees is beneficial to the company and the shareholders compared to the morale hit of a mass layoff. If companies are using mass layoffs to get rid of the "chaff", so to speak, then they have a management problem. Maybe all these companies performing mass layoffs do really have a management problem and hired way more than they should have. But if that's the case maybe the first step is to rectify the management problem rather than to layoff 10-20% of the staff. There really isn't a way that can be done smartly so that you retain the best people and don't destroy morale, effectively harming the shareholders in the long term.

adamrezich 4y ago
> the morale hit of a mass layoff. this is really hard to quantify, especially when it's increasingly becoming standard operating procedure across the industry.
palunon 4y ago
> When I hear people talk about doing what you can to not have mass layoffs I don't think what they mean is that the company has an obligation to the employees that overrides their obligations to their shareholders Depends on who's talking/the situation. When you hear people talking about not closing a profitable factory instead of laying people off to delocalize, that's pretty much what they mean.