Ethics in laying off employees, how would you go about doing this task?Downsizing when you really do not need to.

Downsizing refers to the practice of reducing the total employee strength, primarily with a the intention of getting the same work done by a smaller number of people than the number currently employed. This involves re organization and reassignment of work between employees so that under utilized employees are fully utilized. It also involves laying off orb, in, plain words, removal from employment. The ultimate objective of downsizing is to reduce the employee cost of the company, which is hopefully expected to improve profits.

I cannot imagine why companies would practice downsizing if they believed that they don't need to benefit from it. Only possibility that they would downsize when they really don't need is that they are making some error of judgement about what is in their interest. In that situation, it is more a case of management capability rather than ethics.

Ethical consideration of downsizing primarily revolve around the responsibility of employees to provide continued employment to the people who work for them. This responsibility could be legal, contractual, of moral. Usually laws of the land put some restriction on the power of companies to sack their employees. These restriction relate to the causes for which an employee may be sacked, the compensation to be paid to employee when asked to leave before his or her term of employment is over, and the criteria for selecting employees to be sacked for reasons other than misconduct of the employees concerned.

Thus we can say that though laying off may cause of hardships to some people, it is very much ethical when it leads to improved performance of the company, does not violate any of the companies legal and contractual obligations in letter or spirit, and is done compassionately to minimize the hardships to employees laid off.e implicit contractual obligations in in the form of company defined polices, rules, regulations and practices. These contractual obligations usually define among others, the age of retirement, the period of notice that the employees must be give if sacked before due time, and compensation to be paid.

Moral obligations are of course very difficult to pin down and often require balancing between conflicting requirements. For example though companies are expected to be compassionate about the fate of their employees they also have moral obligation to make profit for their shareholders. In some case the downsizing may be the only way to revive a heavily loss making company. In this case laying of of a small number of employees may ultimately save the jobs of greater number by avoiding the complete closure of the company.

Thus downsizing  may cause hardships to the employees laid off and on that account raises valid ethical issues. However, downsizing is justifiable when it leads to significant and sustained improvement in company's performance, does not violate any legal or contractual obligations of the company in letter or in spirit, and is done compassionately to minimize the hardships to the employees laid off.

Employees take several measure reduce hardships of downsizing. The primary approach is to give employee a choice of voluntary retirement scheme  The second approach is to give employees additional compensation beyond the legal and contractual requirements. Also  it is important for the select the employees to be laid off carefully so that only the least productive ones are laid off unless they opt for it voluntarily.