A perception of redundancies

Last year I attended a presentation on current research by Masters and PhD students organized by the academic branch of HRINZ (Human Resources Institute of New Zealand). One of the presentations related to research being conducted on the psychological torment HR professionals suffer as a result of managing redundancies (I don’t think that was the exact title but it was along those lines). Now I don’t remember the name of the person who was conducting the research otherwise I might dig it up and have a closer look but I do remember thinking that this research really made sense.

Redundancies are not something I think I could ever be involved in managing, at least I don’t think so anyway. I’ve never had to manage one, and I am thankful for that. However, I have seen them happen and been on the receiving end of one as well. Why would I not be comfortable managing a redundancy? It’s not because I have a problem with terminating people per se. I have no problems doing this with issues of misconduct or serious misconduct. However, for these issues, it has always been quite clear cut, and usually based on a well-designed and defined procedure. All the terminations I have dealt with of this nature are for very transparent reasons. But redundancies are more opaque and foggy than grey, and certainly not black and white. It is a much harder decision to make. There is a significant impact on the life of the person being made redundant; it affects their self-efficacy and their financial stability. Redundancies are different from terminating someone for misconduct or serious misconduct issues; their employment is terminated for issues that are not that person’s fault, theoretically anyway.

I asked a friend the other day, if they were encountered with a situation where they had a poor performer and an average performer (hypothetically speaking), and they had to get rid of someone from their team, who would they be more inclined to make redundant? The answer was, the poor performer. When I asked why, it was because they didn’t want to put that person through the torment of a performance management process. They’d rather give them a golden handshake and send them on to a, potentially, more suitable role.

This kind of makes sense but doesn’t necessarily give that person the feedback they need to improve or the opportunity to do so. At what point do you decide that a person is simply not suitable for a role? At what point do you decide that a redundancy is more beneficial than going through a performance management process? What is best for the person concerned and is that a decision that the business could or should be making? Is there anything wrong with a redundancy in lieu of performance management? There are so many ethical considerations around this issue that it is no wonder some HR professionals are tormented by it. Redundancies are supposed to follow a clear and transparent process, but do they really?