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The CEO asks the staff which benefits to restore if the economy picks up
By adamg on Wed, 12/16/2009 - 9:01am
Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center CEO made news this spring when he sought employee help in making cuts to reduce the number of layoffs. Now, he reports, he asked the staff what to do should hospital finances continue to improve. Based on their advice, and if the upward trends continue, the hospital will restore pay increases on April 1.
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Comments
they still had layoffs so
they still had layoffs so let's not make it seem as if BIDMC avoided laying off their employees....
You're right, there were layoffs
I've changed that sentence, because the goal was to try to reduce the number of layoffs.
I know I keep gushing over
I know I keep gushing over this man but I can not help it. If you cut salaries and benefits of employees they will be much more willing to compromise if they know that down the road they could get those benefits or salary increases back if things start looking up again. All too often employees are unwilling to negotiate lower pay, benefit cuts and other things because they know that once you lose something it does not come back. Way to buck the trend!
ummm....?
This makes it seem as if BIDMC avoided making layoffs. They didn't. They let go a sizable amount of folks over the past year. If you want to take a look at a hospital that really avoided layoffs, look at Children's
EMC did something similar last year
When the financial crisis sh*t hit the fan a year ago, and it was apparent that substantial cuts had to be made, EMC management solicited its employees via its internal social networking site. Various options were given, and employees overwhelmingly were in favor of taking a pay cut in order to minimize layoffs. Management followed their wishes, implemented a pay cut (not nearly as big as I thought it would be), and a lot of people kept their jobs. Not too shabby.
Paul Levy gets a lot of
Paul Levy gets a lot of press, but I hardly think the steps taken at BIDMC were unusual. Many companies took similar approaches. Mine did -- almost everybody preferred the idea of pay cuts and furloughs over a higher number of selective lay-offs.
This is about our staff
This is not about me. The story got coverage at the time because it WAS unusual at the time for workers to give up pay and benefits to help avoid layoffs. I was actually surprised that it got so much publicity because it just seemed like such a sensible thing to do, but the national media in particular played it up. (The context at the time, was the AIG bonuses, remember?)
For the record, we were able to reduce the number of required layoffs from 600 to well under 100. I wish it could have been fewer still.
former employee
As a former employee @ BIDMC I feel I should chime in. Paul Levy is forgetting to mention that he asked the employees to sacrifice pay raises, benefits, vacation time etc in order to help save jobs. Really, it's not as if the employees had much of a choice because it seemed at the time like there were going to be major layoffs so everyone wanted to save their own jobs any way they could do it. Really, if your CEO said to you either sacrifice for the greater good or you may lose your job, who wouldn't sacrifice their vacation time...? Anywho, I was eventually laid off anyway. Sucks but what can you do...? And I'm still trying to find a job.