Human Resource: Managing the Transitions and Retrenchments

Managing Transition

The face of the labor market is shifting rapidly making the industries go through the Human Resource HR transition and retrenchment management process. When the employees get retrenched then they may feel stressed. After all, they are the ones spending the majority of their career in a specific company and they have been laid off. Organizations can do certain things. Such as, halting the new hiring process, reducing working hours, job sharing, transferring, or relocating workers to sub-companies as an alternative to retrenchment. Alternatively, Industries can also seek help from other consulting firms. Retrenchment should be implemented only after all alternatives have been left out in the company.

Although reducing workers seems an obvious way to reduce the cost of the organization. And retrenchment itself is also costly involving direct and indirect costs for layoffs. When the retrenchment becomes only one option left for the organization. Employees should carry out a precise study to gather information regarding worker’s rights and obligations. Similarly, the business short term plans, the job market of the retrenched workers, and their social demographic breakdown. This helps the employer to envision the possible and alternative options to be consider for the job losses. The organization should have proper management of transition and retrenchment with careful analysis of each aspect.

Managing Human Resource HR Transition and Retrenchment

The following steps will facilitate them to manage the transition and retrenchment process:

Form a retrenchment committee

Organizations must form a committee to manage the process including the top management, all departmental heads, and the employees (representatives). The committee is responsible for reshaping and planning in detail the required number of workforce with skills in each department. They need to determine the time frame and budget required to implement the process.

A retrenchment plan

A Retrenchment plan includes the preliminary information regarding the problems the organization is facing and criteria for decision making. List all the alternatives, considerations, and suggestions by the committee during the consultation process along with detail description of the number of workers under retrenchment with method and schedule. Once the retrenchment proposal is available, they should start consulting with the stakeholders. The consultation plan should address the person to be on consultation, according to the need for consultation, process and information to release. Similarly, voluntary measures, early retirement, length of service, performance record, skills, and qualification are some of the criteria for selection determination. The organization must ensure the selection criteria is non-discriminatory.

The dismissal process

Once the retrenchment planning is complete, the organization announces the retrenchment process that will take place in writing. The selection process for dismissal should be transparent and accurate to the workers. It is important to make sure they received their termination payments on time. Also, an effective manner need to address all the appeals and concerns of the workers.