Slowdown may not be all that bad for organizations if they retain the balance to pull out all those quadrant two items that never saw daylight during long period of growth.
Here’s a list of things that HR departments may want to run through;
1. Take time from CEO and run through manpower plan just in case it was given to you before mid-September 2008.
2. If you’re still hiring, take a hard look at salary structures that you’d offer. You’ll be surprised how much de-risking you can do for your organization now.
3. Offer a salary correction rather than raise at interview. Remember if all assets were over valued, so was human asset and there is no reason that later shouldn’t get corrected. My guess is 20 – 25% correction is a fare call.
4. Functions where deliverables can be easily measured, keep performance linkages to payouts. You can provide for higher payouts on better performance considering value of high performance during slowdown can be much more than usual days.
5. It’s a great time to test senior management commitments, propose a salary cut. Up to 15% salary cut doesn’t hurt anyone’s lifestyle at senior level.
6. While you look at costs, please note that cutting a few cups of tea may not impact costs much but can cause discomfort to large part of the team, so avoid high visibility low impact calls.
7. This is a great time to bring everyone’s attention to performance. Leaders can inspire people to deliver unexpected performances in tough times. This has been seen during wars, natural calamities time and again.
8. Lastly do not stop smiling, playing, movies, rewards, recognitions. Interact with teams regularly and in high spirits. Listen to some Bob Dylan...times they are a changin... :)
