Ranjana Kaushal writes in Business Today her article ‘Downsizing days are over’….
“With recession bottoming out, good times are returning for the working class. Even for beginners, companies have now started releasing the blocked increments and bonuses. That’s not all, foreign trips, family outings at exotic locations and scholarship for children’s higher education are all getting back on offer.” She proceeds to report how many organisations have offered foreign tours to employees, how they have commenced hiring again.

When the economic scenario was very discouraging to organisations, many stopped bonuses, cut down on increments, cut manpower numbers, reduced benefits and generally did everything to curtail employee cost. Research has shown that reducing manpower should be the last option to be adopted by organisations in economic downturn. Unfortunately the tendency to downsize is very strong and downsizing is the first consideration too often.

With economy looking up, the mood is improving. So increments, bonuses are back. This is to be expected. Downsizing has died down. It is not clear whether downsizing tendencies are over.

Vivek