No schadenfreude here

I've written a good bit about the Belo layoffs here, and someone suggested to me today that some readers might be mis-inferring some sort of glee in the postings. Quite to the contrary -- being laid off sucks, particularly when it's by a mega-corporation that's only making smaller tons of money than it wants.

Instead, I'm incredulous that an organization with flagging circulation, whose lifeblood should be local content, is reducing its force in the very areas where it has and is squandering a unique advantage.

Furthermore, I have a general problem with layoffs, in a "cruel-to-be-kind" vein: I've see my share of layoffs in my young life, and my assessment is this: 99/100 times, if management was more dilligent about firing people who weren't pulling their load, the layoff would be unneccessary. But in a reticence to be in a position of telling someone they are sub-standard, they've hurt the organization and the individuals who later have to be laid off in order to make up for the expense of the dead weight. And, when it comes down to the actual layoff, in order to be "fair" (read: not get sued), companies lay off discrete classes instead of individuals, so the bad egg(s) that caused the problem to start with are often the one(s) who survive to keep dragging the organization down.

For what it's worth, I hope that some of those laid-off Beloites will eventually find positions with us. We'd love to have you.

Comments

[Jackson]

I couldn't agree more. I can sit here and give you at least 4 names of people that didn't get cut and damn sure should have gotten the knife. Many people saw this coming from the poor judgement that they have been using for the last three years from the "3rd Party", to the Collin County edition to Aldia, Quick, etc., etc., etc. The first person to go should be MORONey

[Publisher]

Maybe my brain is mush from writing budgets, but I'm not remembering this:

"3rd party?"