Last couple of years saw a lot of firings in the Indian IT industry due to what companies are calling ‘bad economy’ or blaming it on the shift in US policies. From small companies to IT giants like TechMahindra and Cognizant have been in the news for the number of people they have offloaded and also at the same time for not so pleasant firing policies of some of these companies.
The truth of the matter is that economic downturn or not revenue peaking or troughing, ‘letting go’ (a gentle term for firing) is a regular phenomenon in the IT industry. However, it only figures on the front pages of newspapers when it’s a significant number that have been terminated or that have been impacted by it.
The Reasons
The companies give a myriad of reasons when firing its employees such as:
1. Poor Performance: – Employee has been underperforming or not performing as per ‘organization’s expectations’
2. Economic Downturn: – The economy is bad, and the company is no longer getting the projects it used to, so can’t carry the same workforce
3. Project Terminated: – The project for which the employee got hired didn’t come through, or the client terminated an existing project in the middle
4. Long time on Bench: – Not being able to find projects for the employee and that he has spent enough time on the bench
5. Optimization: – The company doesn’t need so many individuals on a project or what is called in corporate parlance ‘tightening the belt’ or ‘optimizing.’
6. Skillset Deficiency: – The skill set of the employee is outdated and has no requirement in the organization
7. Disciplinary reasons: – Professional misconduct, violating terms of employment, etc.
and there are a few other weird ones too, but it broadly fits in the above few reasons.
The Pressing Questions
All the above reasons appear proper to the companies but does it make sense from an employee perspective. Are the companies thinking enough before firing the employees?
Barring the scenarios where an employee’s performance or professional conduct is in question, how prudent is it to fire an employee for the mistakes that are in full or in part a result of the organization (mis)conduct?
The lousy economy or economic downturn doesn’t happen overnight. It’s a long-term coming. Why did the organization fail to see the signs and took the corrective actions long back? Why was it on a hiring spree until last month and suddenly realized that the economy is terrible and the best corrective action that it can take is to fire its employees?
Why are organizations transactional and getting employees for a specific project(s) and what’s an employee’s fault if the organization loses the project, why should she be thrown on the road? Or while hiring did the organization made it clear to the employee about the transactional nature of the job?
Do you hire an employee just for his skillset or you appraise the overall offering that he brings to the table? Didn’t you check his aptitude, attitude, communication skills, grasping abilities, etc.? And if you did, than how those skills can suddenly be outdated?
Technical skills can become obsolete but not the person himself. And even those technical skills are outdated because he was busy slogging 14 hours a day for your organization leaving him no personal time or time to upgrade. Why is it suddenly his fault?
Why don’t companies have good policies and training (and not just having it for the sake of it) in place to enhance the skills of its employees? Why can’t they allow a breathing room in between projects so that employees can rejuvenate and upgrade themselves?
A tired horse will not go far, how many times will you keep on changing your ride?
When it comes to firing due to ‘unsatisfactory performance’ (a favorite one of the organizations), the organizations are still not asking themselves the obvious questions and instead are satisfied to wash off their hands by giving the employees and themselves some random reason. The questions organizations should be asking themselves at such time are:
1. What caused the unsatisfactory performance of the employee? Is it temporary or has it always been at this level since the beginning?
2. Has the employee received timely and quality feedback based on which he can improve himself?
3. Have the causes of performance degradation been identified with the employee? Has the organization addressed those issues on its end which made the employee’s performance decline or can help him to improve the performance?
d. Most importantly, if we have established the unsatisfactory performance and decided to let an employee go, has the organization done introspection as to how come such a low performing candidate seeped in through its multiple filtering interview rounds? Does the interview process need to change or needs an overhaul?
Fixing the Problem
An Organization is a business entity and mostly exists for profit, it is well understood, but at the same time, it has a responsibility towards its employees as well and not just those mentioned in the corporate brochure or HR policies. Organizations need to understand and inculcate in its policies the adage that “Employees are the biggest assets” (and it’s not merely a sentence to be put in the speeches and corporate presentation), and if an organization fails to take care of them than the projects, work, and organization as a whole is going to suffer.
Sometimes people are a wrong fit for a job, and sometimes organizations are the wrong fit. It’s alright, and both have the right to part ways but if an employee is underperforming or there are genuine reasons for letting an employee go then spend enough time, talk to the employees getting affected by such policies and then carve out a sensible and humane parting policy. Give them enough information, feedback, and support so that they can improve their performance up to the standard you want or can find an alternative.
If any organization does the math well, they will understand that hiring an employee(sourcing, interviewing, negotiating, notice period), giving them time to settle making them productive and then praying they work out is a much costly and risky affair then working with and improving an existing employee.