On Friday April 4, 1997 the Cincinnati, Ohio based company Andrew Jergens laid off 28 of its full time employees. All of the employees were surprised by the abrupt notice given to them by management. As soon as the laborers arrived to work that day management issued a pink slip immediately. The response was appalling and emotionally overwhelming. Many of the laid off employees had worked for the Japanese owned company for 5, 10 and 15 years. Other employees who didn't receive a pink slip blamed it on management although the official position of the company for laying off its full-time, permanent employees was lack of sales due to competition with Procter & Gamble. The plant workers feel that it was bad decisions made by management with its patent dispute over its body shampoo with P&G and their acquisition of new and expensive machines that their mechanics couldn't fix immediately due to improved technology which required additional training. In other words, the official statement given by the Kao Corporation-owned Andrew Jergens Company for laying off its employees may not be true. Wasteful spending could be the central reason why the company is losing money and unable to compete effectively with P&G. The sad part about the entire issue is that immediately after the employees were escorted off the property, Olsten temporaries came in to replace the laid off workers. The rationale behind this tactic is obvious: reduced expenses, increased productivity equals a profit. The management feel that it is to their best interest to get rid of the employees who are being paid $12, $15, or $20 an hour plus benefits and replace them with temporary workers who will be paid $8 an hour and no benefits, while pushing the temporaries for increase productivity. The Japanese owned company, Andrew Jergens, is expected to layoff ten or more employees on Friday, April 11, 1997. Many employees who didn't receive a pink slip on April 4 are preparing for the worse. One employee, who wants to remain anonymous, says "this is a polite way of saying to us you're fired".
Re: Andrew Jergens Company Layoff Employees
Written by Steven Loh on April 9, 1997
Baruti,
Your news release seems to hint at unfair or unethical conduct by the company, and that the laid off workers are unwitting victims. Let me try and put a different perspective on it.
Throughout Asia, and especially in Singapore and Hong Kong, such layoffs occur all the time and no tears are lost. Indeed no time is lost either. Inefficient companies die, and from the remains rise new companies that go on to die again and again, as new ideas, services, products meet their test in the market place. Success comes to the company that is relevant and resource-efficient. Laidoff workers go and find new jobs, only to be laid off again until they learn that they have to bring marketable skills to the workplace at marketable prices. So they go back to school, or they apprentice themselves to learn a new trade, while they invest in their children, urging them to go to school and not grow up to be like daddy.
It is always unpopular to take the side of the law of the jungle, the call of the market place. I know for one that the armchair liberal theorists will find fault with my posting immediately. But in the real world of the market place, of running a business, of providing for your employees, shareholders, customers, and remembering that the boss also has his needs, what is "unfair" for some workers can be "fair" for the stakeholders, and finally, for society. Darwinian though it sounds, there are many, many places in the world where this is daily experience, and where resources, be they personnel, capital, technology, etc, are re-cycled for the better good of the whole economy, and ultimately, society.
Balancing the need of the laidoff workers to meaningful dignified employment and the needs of the owners and shareholders to meaningful investment returns is key to this issue. We must also not forget the needs of those workers not laid off, who also need gainful, dignified employment. Again, the temps now gain some new degree of permanence compared to a situation where they may not even know if they are going to find work the next day. Perhaps the laidoff workers forget that they first joined this company years ago as a temp? The greater efficiency, ie, profitability, of the company can only be for the better benefit of all stakeholders.
We should love our neighbours, yes, but in a fully market driven society, we believe that the boss is also a neighbour. You tamper with the market mechanism, and you introduce a plethora of new dangers to the very workers that you had intended to help in the first place.
Steven
Re: Andrew Jergens Company Layoff Employees
Written by Andrew Drazdik on April 7, 1998
Mr. Kamau
I recently read an article you wrote concerning the Andrew Jergens Company. You had reported that a number of employees had been laid off and replaced with part time or replacement employees. I have seen this also happen in another Japanese owned company in Pennslyvania, namely Sony. I am currently interning at Jergens parent company in Japan, the Kao Corporation, and may be recruited by their human resources for a researching position. I do not approve of their actions towards dedicated working Americans as only economical assets. If you have any futher information about the Andrew Jergens Company and their management or business practices I would be very interested to hear about them before my interview with the company.
Best Regards
Andrew Drazdik