Feeling the economic downturn? Respect for your employees must come first…if you want your business to survive.
Many employers tend to forget the fact that offices are nothing more than empty walls. A company cannot run without its people. Even fully-automated robotic manufacturing companies still rely on humans to monitor their operations. With the current financial situation in the GCC, many companies are going through hardship while trying to maintain enough liquidity to operate, so management needs to make drastic decisions in order to save these businesses. Cutting expenses is the main key to doing so, either by reducing operational size (i.e. closing down some branches) or shutting down support departments while focusing only upon core operations. Other examples might include selling company assets, reducing hours of operation to one shift (if your business has a front end), and eliminating extra expenses like company bonuses and rewards.
IN BUSINESS, IT’S LESS COSTLY TO KEEP YOUR CURRENT STAFF THAN TO REPLACE THEM.
With emphasis on the last point mentioned, removing additional payments to your staff has significant impact. As we know, employees are driven by job satisfaction to increase their productivity, but the core driver, which some employers unfortunately tend to forget, is the employee’s wage. The Prophet Mohammed PBUH has told us to “Give the worker his wages before his sweat dries.” Not only is it against the labor law to delay payments, it is morally and ethically wrong, with severe consequences that will affect your business over time. It is a domino effect which could lead to business collapse.
If you are struggling to pay your current staff, then you simply cannot afford new employees. In business, it’s less costly to keep your current staff than to replace them. Management needs to make immediate financial decisions, even if it comes down to reducing the number of staff. Employees may work for the love of the company, or the sense of belonging they were provided, but at the end of the day, the main reason they wake up in the morning and come to work is to get paid. A car cannot run without fuel, and you cannot expect your employees to deliver without pay. Depriving them of wages produces a chain reaction that kills their motivation, their faith in the business, their respect for superiors and business-owners, and, finally, their will to perform.
LET STAFF GO AND REDUCE COMPANY SIZE RATHER THAN KEEPING THEM AND DELAYING THEIR PAYMENT.
Even if employees agree to stay with the company through the hardship, we cannot expect them to perform at 100% like they used to. Even the brightest, most hardworking employee will suffer at least a 40% performance decline. Let staff go and reduce company size rather than keeping them and delaying their payment. If you do the latter, you’ve just shot yourself in the foot.
