Breaking-up is hard to do, especially in the work environment.
Just ask the employees of Starbucks Corp., which informed the first 100 workers of its planned 6,700 cuts with what reads like a corporate version of a "dear John" letter. Possibly to engender some goodwill with existing employees, Starbucks sent the letters Thursday about the layoffs to existing workers, addressing them as partners. The Seattle Times
published the text.
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Here's a small excerpt:
Dear Partners,
As we communicated on January 28, Starbucks is reshaping our operating model and organization structure to ensure the long-term health of our business. This includes the difficult but necessary decision to reduce our global workforce.
As part of our commitment to transparency throughout this process, we wanted to inform you that approximately 100 non-store partners (including Partner Resources and Partner & Asset Protection) are being notified today that their positions have been eliminated. About 40 of those partners are located at the Starbucks Support Center (SSC) in Seattle.
You may be wondering why these groups are being notified this week if we have not yet notified other displaced partners. PRO and P&AP have unique responsibilities supporting internal client groups during a workforce reduction. Due to the organizational changes in these groups, we felt it respectful to inform these partners now, prior to our broader notification day in mid-February. For partners in a few international markets, this may be somewhat later in order to comply with local employment laws.
The coffee giant's layoffs come the same day that the Department of Labor announced that businesses trimmed 598,000 jobs in January. That's the highest number since December 1974 and worse than forecasts for a loss of 540,000 jobs.
Starbucks did say it is offering separation pay, benefits and outplacement assistance to its downsized partners -- better than what most people get after receiving a "dear John" letter. - Gerald Magpily
See Seattle Times article
