GENDER PAY PARITY: THE GOOGLE EXPERIENCE

ABSTRACT

Gender equality/inequality is a topic that has been discussed around tables for over a century, ever since debates like women “expanding roles” from homemaker and caregiver to getting a “right” to work, “right” to vote, “right” to hold political office et cetra. Movements have spun out of these debates which have led to a push for and eventual achievement of change in these topics. A corollary of this is the gender pay equality endeavor, which pushes for the parity of pay among members of the different sexes holding the same job roles and qualifications. This gender pay issue has been pushed for by individuals, organizations, courts, governments and so on for years, with varying levels of progress in different industries and locations. The focus of this research is on gender pay equality/inequality in Google, a limited liability company and technology giant headquartered in California under a parent company called Alphabet.

To shed light on pay differences if any in the company.

OUTLINE

Abstract                                                                                        2

Introduction                                                                                 4

Legislation                                                                                    4

Background                                                                                  5

Googlers                                                                                       6

Google Accusers                                                                          6

Issues                                                                                            7

Effects

Way Forward

Reference                                                                                    10

INTRODUCTION

Gender, for the intent and purpose of this research is restricted to two, being male and female. While pay is the commiserate payment made for work done by either or both members of the gender. There have been various reports on pay disparity between male workers and their female counterparts in general, but other studies show further disparities in certain groupings for example race down to ethnic, location/region, industry, age, educational qualification and such (Hill, 2017).

LEGISLATION

With respect to legislation, gender pay parity is protected by several laws, the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act – 1964, Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, The Equal Pay Act of 1963 (signed by J.F.K.), Title I of the American Act-1990. “The discriminatory-pay laws is inclusive of all monies given to workers as remuneration for employment. All forms of payments are covered, plus salary, overtime, bonus, stock options, profit sharing and bonus plans, insurance, vacation with leave pay, cleaning or gas allowances, hotel accommodations, travel expenses refund and benefits”.

 Pay difference is fine in  instances where there is earned merit, rank, quantity or quality of production and factors other than sex.” (EEOC, 2017).

Closer to home, Governor Brown signed into effect as of January 1^st 2017, the California Fair Pay Act, which put into law the paying of equal renumeration to employees of different sex with substantially similar work, making it harder for employers to use a "bona fide factor other than sex" defense. (

In the U.S. according to State report on annual earnings and full time earning for workers in 2016, there is still a big lagging median gap of 20% between the female full time worker and her male counterpart, with a range from 70% for women and 100% for men in Louisiana and 89% for women and 100% for men in New York and all other 48 states fall in between: with California (Google’s headquarters) on 88% for women, as second highest in the country.

BACKGROUND

Google LLC, a company that started in 1998 as a search engine called “Backrub”

Google’s vision and mission statement is “Organizing the world's information and making it universally accessible plus useful.” (Google, 1998)

Which remains true, from her unconventional décor to the customary colorful ambience, Googles has maintained a style unique to itself, its proclamation to stakeholders and the rest of the world is that of its core beliefs which has been to emphasize an atmosphere of creativity and challenge (Page, 2004).

The organization financial value post joining NASDAQ in 2004, it is worth 770.47 billion dollars. With a staff strength of over 88,000 people in full-time roles, having hundreds of offices worldwide, Google is the most visited website in the world. In a bid to be different and continue their mission and vision, unorthodox is their norm. Google is what is referred to as a learning organization, hence the company has a large waiting list pool of people hoping to work in the place.

GOOGLERS

Despite the glowing accolades from a very diverse Google staff body, Googlers as they are called, Google has appeared over the past few years in headlines that have to do with them paying female Googlers at a different/lower rate from male Googlers. Google being a learning organization takes the lead in workplace design, organizational structure and so on.

GOOGLE’S ACCUSERS

Despite Google’s released statement that “Yearly, they perform a full and robust analysis of pay across genders  and they have found no pay gap,"  (Politi). There have been fingers pointed at the tech giant’s pay practices with regards to parity or no parity among different genders within the company.

The Department of Labor released a statement about huge disparities in pay between gender, calling it “systemic” as it is perceived to be company-wide. This is on the wake of a case against Google in January 2017 asking the court to enforce the request to see the Tech Giant’s payroll data.

All the more pressing for DOL because Google is a government contractor hence it is bound by law to submit to checks. In response, Google stated, the actions of D.O.L. are “fishing” (Politi, 2017)

“ Google argued, and won, a court ruling in July2017 contending the DoL had no evidence of inequitable pay and was asking for too much data. The agency wanted 15 years worth of info and contact info on more than 25,000 employees. The judge authorized less data, including contact data for 8,000 employees” (Bort, 2017)

Natasha Lamb (activist-investor, managing partner in Arjuana) in her statement to Alphabet (Google’s parent company) shareholders, accused them of paying lip service to bridging the gender pay gap and sharing vital payroll data for external audit of its pay structure unlike other large firms like eBay, Intel, Amazon, Adobe, Microsoft, Apple, Expedia who had complied. (Baron, 2017). Worthy to note, Facebook was the only other tech giant not to comply, Lamb’s reason was concentrated voting of the above 50% of the founder (s). To which Schmidt (C.E.O. of Google) responded with an emphatic NO on behalf of shareholders who had repeatedly voted against the idea.

James Damore, a former engineer and former employee for google released a damning memo about gender bias that first circulated in-house then went viral. He claims to have written this as a reaction to things discussed at a diversity workshop organized by Google, in an interview with Stefan Molyneux, he further said Google should strive to be a “female friendly environment”.

According to Susan Wojcicki (Youtube CEO), the words of Damore, were “unfounded bias”, and that it would have had less traction or made the news had portions of the memo with the word “females” been replaced with “another group”.

Three people filed against Google in September 2017, with a pay discrimination claim which was dismissed three months later by a California court due to the non-specificity of aggrieved group of people.

January 2018, these plaintiffs added a fourth and filed a revised suit based on pay discrimination in specific job roles like “engineering, management, sales, and teaching”.

The last is “Lamar claims that of the 150 teachers employed by Google during her tenure, just three were men. Two of the men hired were paid more than all but one of the women hired, she alleges” (O’Brien, 2018).

In their response, Google representative Ms Gina Scigliano said to CNNMoney that the company disagrees with the central allegations of this amended lawsuit (O’Brien).

Most of these occurred in the wake of this retrospectively grandiose release, “At Google, we don’t just accept difference—we celebrate it, we support it, and we thrive on it for the benefit of our employees, our products, and our community. Google is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and is an affirmative action employer.” (Google, )

ISSUES AND EFFECTS

A resultant  effect is reduced motivation to work, may lead to absenteeism in the affected group.

Higher employee turnover is the most likely corollary of the above in an organization, the people being discriminated against or even those who perceive they are being discriminated against will leave the company as employees are not loyal to employers they do not trust.

Employees will also leave if they do not see advancement prospects for example promotion, recognition, delegation and so on.

Some years back when Google observed and investigated its increased female employees’ exit from the company to other companies, they found out their maternity package was not competitive, so they adjusted it and plugged the outflow of talent they were hemorrhaging

“It is unlawful to retaliate against an individual for opposing employment practices that discriminate based on compensation or for filing a discrimination charge, testifying, or participating in any way in an investigation, proceeding, or litigation under Title VII, ADEA, ADA or the Equal Pay Act”

Gender pay gap can inhibit a company’s ability to attract and keep top talent especially when it reports a low percentage of female employees to male and even lower percentage of females in leadership roles,

WAY FORWARD

In organizations plagued with pay discrimination, there should be a change, as Shaw succinctly puts it,  “Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.” Although Shaw perfectly expresses how important change is, his quote doesn’t acknowledge how hard it is to carry out.

As with most organizational plans, carrying out anything successfully requires management input, or even spearheading, capable managers to lead the charge for a better future for all stakeholders.

With how constant change is according to Gibson et al (2012), it is the most frequently used word on the business pages of every newspaper in the world’ hence managing change is primary to the function of today’s efficient manager.

Google is no stranger to employing experts or consultants; who know the stumbling blocks to organizational change. These are employees’ lack of trust towards management, employee’s self interest (instances where change is not to employee’s advantage), difference in views if what the change is and can bring, fear (shown as impatience not as what it is, fear of not fitting into the future the change would bring) and so on.

On the part of the employee, in instances where pay disparity is due to less/lack of “aggression” as a study on the disparity between pay in male and female Uber drivers explained that, “gender-based preferences can open gender earnings gaps," the authors said. Male Uber drivers apparently like to drive fast, not necessarily to earn more, but because they are "more risk-tolerant and aggressive" on the road by nature, the study found. Men gain an extra earnings edge by working more hours on average, allowing them to learn more quickly and target the best locations to pick up passengers” (Khoreva, 2018) hence, could some Google female employees be more aggressive and outspoken in getting ahead career-wise especially in instances where the other reasons for disparity have been eliminated. YouTube C.E.O. Wojcicki, stated how, she even had to on one occasion call and talk to a Silicon Valley old timer and mentor to get a her into a conference career-wise she had earned a right to be in, but had not been invited.

It is clear, this work is not a one-man or in this case, one-company job, more has to be done on all sides to close the pay disparity gap that is albeit lower than say four decades ago but had almost ground to a halt in the amount of progress made in the immediate past.

REFERENCES

           EEOC Facts About Equal Pay and Compensation Discrimination. Retrieved from https://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/publications/fs-epa.cfm

           California Equal Pay Act (2017, October). Retrieved from https://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/California_Equal_Pay_Act.htm

          Page L. & Brin S. (2004) 2004 Founders’ IPO Letter Retrieved from  An Owner’s Manual” for Google’s Shareholders¹ https://abc.xyz/investor/founders-letters/2004/ipo-letter.html#_ga=2.187468008.1588571426.1519364786-2123570663.1519364786

            Politi D. (2017, April 8)  Department of Labor Accuses Google of “Extreme” Gender Pay Discrimination, Accessed on http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/04/08/department_of_labor_accuses_google_of_extreme_gender_pay_discrimination.html

            Baron E., (2017, June7th) Google parent Alphabet gender-pay proposal dead on arrival. Bay Area News Group. Retrieved from https://www.mercurynews.com/2017/06/07/google-parent-alphabet-shareholders-shoot-down-gender-pay-report-proposal/

           MacGregor J. (2017, August 9^th). One of Google’s highest-ranking women has answered that controversial memo with a very personal essay. Washington Post. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/on-leadership/wp/2017/08/09/one-of-googles-highest-ranking-women-has-answered-that-controversial-memo-with-a-very-personal-essay/?utm_term=.4ba3e0d8692a

          O’Brien A. (2018, January 3) Google hit with revised gender pay lawsuit

Accessed from

               Khoreva, V. (2011) Uber's female drivers earn less than men (but it's not what you think). Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal; Birmingham Vol. 30, Iss. 3,  233-248 Accessed from http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A526998513/HWRC?u=lirn30069&sid=HWRC&xid=5f41e828. Accessed on 2018, February 14^th

             Bort, J. (2017, September 28^th). An Activist Investor Praises Apple, And Slams Google, Over Equal Pay For Women Transparency. The Business Insider Accessed from http://www.businessinsider.com/arjuna-capital-slams-google-over-equal-pay-for-women-data-2017-9

              Gibson. Ivanosevch, Donnelly &  (2012) Organisation Behavior Structure and Processus 14, Pp 488-494

GENDER PAY PARITY: THE GOOGLE EXPERIENCE

ABSTRACT

Gender equality/inequality is a topic that has been discussed around tables for over a century, ever since debates like women “expanding roles” from homemaker and caregiver to getting a “right” to work, “right” to vote, “right” to hold political office et cetra. Movements have spun out of these debates which have led to a push for and eventual achievement of change in these topics. A corollary of this is the gender pay equality endeavor, which pushes for the parity of pay among members of the different sexes holding the same job roles and qualifications. This gender pay issue has been pushed for by individuals, organizations, courts, governments and so on for years, with varying levels of progress in different industries and locations. The focus of this research is on gender pay equality/inequality in Google, a limited liability company and technology giant headquartered in California U.S.A..

To shed light on pay differences if any in the company.

INTRODUCTION

Gender, for the intent and purpose of this research is restricted to two, being male and female. While pay is the commiserate payment made for work done by either or both members of the gender. There have been various reports on pay disparity between male workers and their female counterparts in general, but other studies show further disparities in certain groupings for example race down to ethnic, location/region, industry, age, educational qualification and such (Hill, 2017).

LEGISLATION

With respect to legislation, gender pay parity is protected by several laws, the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act – 1964, Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, The Equal Pay Act of 1963 (signed by J.F.K.), Title I of the American Act of 1990. The laws against discriminatory pay includes all payments given to or on behalf workers as remuneration for employment. All forms of payments are covered, plus salary, overtime, bonus, stock options, profit sharing and bonus plans, insurance, vacation with leave pay, cleaning or gas allowances, hotel accommodations, travel expenses refund and benefits.

 Pay difference is fine in  instances where there is earned merit, rank, quantity or quality of production and factors other than sex. (EEOC, 2017).

Closer to home, Governor Brown signed into effect as of January 1^st 2017, the California Fair Pay Act, which put into law the paying of equal remuneration to employees of different sex with substantially similar work, making it harder for employers to use a "bona fide factor other than sex" defense. 

In the U.S. according to State report on annual earnings and full time earning for workers in 2016, there is still a big lagging median gap of 20% between the female full time worker and her male counterpart, with a range from 70% for women and 100% for men in Louisiana and 89% for women and 100% for men in New York and all other 48 states fall in between: with California (Google’s headquarters) on 88% for women, as second highest in the country.

BACKGROUND

Google LLC, a company that started in 1998 as a search engine called “Backrub”

Google’s vision and mission statement is Organizing the world's information and making it universally accessible plus useful.

Which remains true, from her unconventional décor to the customary colorful ambience, Googles has maintained a style unique to itself, its proclamation to stakeholders and the rest of the world is that of its core beliefs which has been to emphasize an atmosphere of creativity and challenge (Page, 2004).

The organization financial value post joining NASDAQ in 2004, it is worth 770.47 billion dollars. With a staff strength of over 88,000 people in full-time roles, having hundreds of offices worldwide, Google is the most visited website in the world. In a bid to be different and continue their mission and vision, unorthodox is their norm. Google is what is referred to as a learning organization, hence the company has a large waiting list pool of people hoping to work in the place.

GOOGLE’s

Despite the glowing accolades from a very diverse Google staff body, Googlers as they are called, Google has appeared over the past few years in headlines that have to do with them paying female Googlers at a different/lower rate from male Googlers.

The Department of Labor released a statement about huge disparities in pay between gender, calling it “systemic” as it is perceived to be company-wide. This is on the wake of a case against Google in January 2017 asking the court to enforce the request to see the Tech Giant’s payroll data.

All the more pressing for DOL because Google is a government contractor hence it is bound by law to submit to checks. In response, Google stated, the actions of D.O.L. are “fishing” (Politi, 2017)

Despite Google’s statement that “Yearly, they perform a full and robust analysis of pay across genders  and they have found no pay gap," Google said in a statement.

“ (Politi)

“At Google, we don’t just accept difference—we celebrate it, we support it, and we thrive on it for the benefit of our employees, our products, and our community. Google is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and is an affirmative action employer.” (Google, )

Natasha Lamb (managing partner in Arjuana) in her statement to Alphabet (Google’s parent company) shareholders, accused them of paying lip service to bridging the gender pay gap and sharing vital payroll data for external audit of its pay structure unlike large firms like eBay, Intel, Amazon et cetra who complied. (Baron, 2017).

 James Damore, a former engineer and former employee for google released a damning memo

According to Susan Wojcicki (Youtube CEO), the words of the employee, were unfounded bias, and that it would have had less traction had the parts with “females” been replaced wit “another group”.

Gender pay gap can inhibit a company’s ability to attract and keep top talent especially when it reports a low percentage of female employees to male and even lower percentage of females in leadership roles,

Carrying out a standard salary audit, can help.  “Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.” Although Shaw perfectly expresses how important change is, his quote doesn’t acknowledge how hard it is to carry out

 It is also unlawful to retaliate against an individual for opposing employment practices that discriminate based on compensation or for filing a discrimination charge, testifying, or participating in any way in an investigation, proceeding, or litigation under Title VII, ADEA, ADA or the Equal Pay Act

REFERENCES

           EEOC Facts About Equal Pay and Compensation Discrimination. Retrieved from https://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/publications/fs-epa.cfm

           California Equal Pay Act (2017, October). Retrieved from https://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/California_Equal_Pay_Act.htm

          Page L. & Brin S. (2004) 2004 Founders’ IPO Letter Retrieved from  An Owner’s Manual” for Google’s Shareholders¹ https://abc.xyz/investor/founders-letters/2004/ipo-letter.html#_ga=2.187468008.1588571426.1519364786-2123570663.1519364786

            Politi D. (2017, April 8)  Department of Labor Accuses Google of “Extreme” Gender Pay Discrimination, Accessed on http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/04/08/department_of_labor_accuses_google_of_extreme_gender_pay_discrimination.html

            Baron E., (2017, June7th) Google parent Alphabet gender-pay proposal dead on arrival. Bay Area News Group. Retrieved from https://www.mercurynews.com/2017/06/07/google-parent-alphabet-shareholders-shoot-down-gender-pay-report-proposal/

           MacGregor J. (2017, August 9^th). One of Google’s highest-ranking women has answered that controversial memo with a very personal essay. Washington Post. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/on-leadership/wp/2017/08/09/one-of-googles-highest-ranking-women-has-answered-that-controversial-memo-with-a-very-personal-essay/?utm_term=.4ba3e0d8692a

Case study: TOP LEADERS: INTEL CEO

1.

Internal- existing or occurring inside or within, while recruitment is the action of finding new people to join/support an organization. Internal recruitment is the picking of existing people/employees for a role. 

Companies with a look to the future, that is, organization's leadership, put significant effort towards selection. Those with a view on continuity lean in the direction of internal selection of successor.

The internal recruitment of executives is a sound policy and it has had noteworthy successes in the past,both within and outside Intel. 

For one, it brings into the role someone who has established their loyalty to the organization. Two. the employee has most likely imbibed the organizational culture since he/she is already in the system. Three. Though companies have varying disclosure rates, the early/advance choice of C.E.O. is possibly stems from an effort to strengthen a culture of risk oversight (Conference board, 2017 July). Four. A chance at understudying the current C.E.O. before entering the role that is an apprenticeship for example. Five this method is cheaper than external recruitment and as the driving down of cost is always welcome within and organization, this makes the policy more attractive and viable. Six the use of institutional knowledge which the employee being internally recruited already possesses. Seven, it spikes the morale of staff hopeful to get selected. Eight it revitalizes the employees and fuels competition. Nine Internal recruitment of C.E.O. may lead to promotion of another employee to replace the new C.E.O.’s former role and promoting from within allows almost all of external hiring at the “entry level.” (in the case of organizations with commitment to internal hiring) Also, entry-level is cheaper to fill, has a larger candidate pool, and gives more time to train and assess those that aspire to reach higher level positions.  

There are different disadvantages to internal recruitment, that is, when a soon to be "hired" employee is unable to disengage from current role, this may delay his/her filling of the new role. in the instance of an organization with strong internal recruitment policy, and no suitable internal candidate, hiring process may be delayed. Though is not the case with Intel CEO recruitment as this is started a decade in advance.

2.

Paul Otellini was different, even in cases of organizations vying away from the norm. He had been in the organization for thirty-one years before taking the CEO position, he was far from new to the industry, as a sales and marketing executive for decades, he had product knowledge and familiarity with clients taste, preference and cultivated relationships with those who would become strong/main clients for example IBM, Apple. Also led the production of Intel Pentium Chip in 1993, has experience as the Chief Operational Officer for a short while.

Also he apprenticed under Craig Barnett, the outgoing CEO, this tradition " Moore set the example in the mid-1980s, when he allowed Andy Grove, then his second in command, to gradually assume CEO chores; likewise, in the mid-1990s, Grove steadily ceded his authority to Barrett" (Gibson, 2012). Though he resorted to a laying off of 10% of its staff towards saving 3$ billion dollars in two years, he brought the annual revenue from 34$ billion to 57$ billion in the space of 7 years.

3

“The fact that two-thirds of non-financial S&P 500 companies did not survive 1988-2007 attests to rapidly changing nature of long term successes” (Steingraber, 2011). A study of 36 companies in 25 different industries that outperformed the rest in the 20year period understudy, had consistent leaders, for example Microsoft, Best buy, Johnson, Honda, Nike, Caterpillar, Colgate-Palmolive, McDonalds et cetra Chief among these being intel. Study showed none of the other non-financial S&P 500 companies did as well nor surpassed them, based on metrics like rise in Revenue, ROA, ROE, Share value and so on.

Still there are organizations who plan their executive succession and but fail in execution, due to poor management. 

Some organizations believe executive succession begins and ends with a good headhunter, the process is much more painstaking and personal becauuse this is your face to the world, that is your core value as an organization.

Organization's top executives may have ulterior plans for certain executive positions, though it is the role of the board, things may be put in play to frustrate plans/efforts or the board itself may be used to remove certain executives for example Eckard Pfiffer; Rod Canion, Apple; Steve Jobs et cetra. Also if an organization is unstable, there will not be a good enough environment for planning. 

S.E.C. has increased its over-watch on boards, as they are in charge of succession selection in a need for more transparency in the process. Despite its success, many organizations do not practice it, some organizations apply the fire-brigade approach for picking executives, even C.E.O.s

  

References

            Steingraber F.G. & Kelley School of Business, Indiana University. 2011 Home Grown C.E.O. ATKearney Inc Pp 1-17

            Freeman K. Retrieved from https://www.helioshr.com/2015/04/5-benefits-of-recruiting-internally-vs-externally/ 

            Accessed https://www.conference-board.org/publications/publicationdetail.cfm?publicationid=7537

             Gibson, J.L, Ivancevich J.N. et al Organization’s Behavior, Structure, Process. 14^th edition Pp 364-367. McGraw-Hill International Edition.

Case study: STRESSED OUT AT WORK? HELP IS ON THE WAY

This case study shows what organizations do to reduce its employee's stress levels, by first defining and describing what stress is, in its various forms, there are problems associated with stress for all involved, be it for the employees, the organizations, employee's families et cetra. There have been quantifiable results from the different organizations' activities to eliminate stress. Included are recommendations to further aid in eradicating stress.

What are the primary reasons why many employees are experiencing high levels of stress at work nowadays? Identify and describe these reasons.

Stress is a not a normal state of being, it may be due to a strain, demanding and/or adverse events, it can have both mental and emotional symptoms then become physical in manifestations. Despite its negative effects, surprisingly stress is quite common nowadays in the workplace. Stress can be induced by several factors anxiety over job security, familial situations, workplace interpersonal relations (for example; a difficult boss, uncooperative colleagues and insubordinate associates), health, economic situation, global events, financial matters, downsizing (the corollary of which are increased job responsibility/workload) "high performance work cultures" (Gibson, Donnelly, Ivancevich & Konopaske, 2012) and so on. Stress in an employee highly impacts output in many cases leading to lower function levels and less achievement, even eventual absenteeism due to reduced job satisfaction and lower motivation. 

For the organization with high-stress environment, this leads to higher employee turn-over rates, more spending on the recruitment of replacements and training of said replacements, though if the stress-inducing environment persists in the organization, the cycle continues with the new replacements. The onus is on the organization to nip it inn the bud, through it's management. It is worthy to note that a workaday level of stress is functional as it drives the employee to push himself further than he usually would to achieve set task(s).

                                                                                                                

2,. Why do many of the survivors of layoffs experience stress? Conventional wisdom would suggest that these employees should be happy that they didn’t get laid off. Explain your answer.

A significant source of workplace stress is P.T.S.D. in the remaining employees (fear of being next on the layoff list) in an organization that just laid off, 

In scores of cases of layoffs, certain actions of the management leaves the employees unhappy that is: 

            A. the proceeding is often not well handled for example the indicators for a spending reduction is often seen early but acted upon late hence creating a hurried staff-redundancy process.

           B. Organizations often cover up the situation either to try to save jobs (to avoid looking financial trouble) then in an eventuality of layoffs, the organization creates a "good news" announcement as a distraction (McKenna, 2009), 

           C. Organizations often act as if the layoffs did not happen.

           D. Management erroneously start to try to spread a cherry atmosphere when employees are still coming to terms with the layoffs.

despite the management's expected reaction of relief in remaining employees, for not being laid off employees still go through a change of attitude, motivation levels et cetra

After the global financial recession of 2007, the banking industry which had the top most secured jobs in the labor industry suddenly had to let people go as they were not making even close to it's previous revenue hence it was downsizing or to use correct lingo "right sizing". This led to a lot of bankers voluntarily leaving for other industries.

Some of the ways to better handle layoffs are to do it the layoff process should be handled by trained professionals (before, during and after), counselling should be made available if not mandatory then with incentive for remaining staff after layoff, this provides a safe outlet for them, organization can use the E.A.P.

Due to loss of trust as a result of lay off, more needs to be done to reassure the remaining staff of the organizations continued focus on their welfare. Plan to give employees grieving time. provide open doors for questions from employees not laid off, give extra attention to your top performers to ensure you retain them, 

3., What are companies doing to decrease the stress levels of their employees? To what degree do you think that these steps will help them retain valued employees?

 The aim of the organization's management is to eliminate above "moderate" level stress, in employees in order to better staff health, staff welfare, reduce organization's cost/spending plus increase or normalize retention rates. Various organizations have taken different steps to fight workplace stress, for example organizations partaking in the Employee Assistance Program have seen certain improvements in the overall health of employees, reduction in stress-induced problems, more man-hours extricated from less sick time et cetra with focus on helping substance abuse & addiction which metamorphosed into psych care of employees, then extended to personal finance management; companies like IBM, Schools, Google and so on. Amazon also includes in the EAP benefits extending to family-members of employees on legal, financial, personal and such matters. Another form of stress combating done by organizations is the Wellness program, its focus is mental and physical health of employees. An example is Google's stocking of 8 inch plates beside 12 inch ones to encourage staff eating small portions. Piala Inc. a Japanese company, in it's response from non-smoking staff complaint about their smoking colleagues' 15 mins-paid-smoking-breaking, gave six extra vacation days yearly to non-smokers. This move by Piala not only reduced stress of the disgruntled non-smoking workforce but probably also inspired healthier choices in its smoking demography. To quote the CEO Takei

 “I hope to encourage employees to quit smoking through incentives, rather than penalties or coercion” (Huffington Post, 2017).

In my personal experience with ZTE (telco firm) in Nigeria, we had two hours, thirty minutes break daily and a nap room to boot. And for those whose break coincides with an appointment out side the office, a thirty-five dollar equivalent spending will be reimbursed to them for however many days these occur. When I asked one of the HR execs, she said it is due to the strain of the type of work we do, a kind of ensuring welfare of staff. In our Headquarters in China, the office space and sitting was arranged in such a way that one could pull out their collapsible camp-bed during the two hours, thirty minutes break and have a power nap under one’s desk.

Five years ago Google, increased the length of its maternal leave allowance, this was done to stem the observed increase in employee turn over and it worked by fifty percent (Manjoo, 2013), although there were no lay offs, Google’s action can be replicated for remaining staff after lay offs, there are other perks like non-monetary ones that make employee feel the organization still cares. Offering in-house managerial training to top performers in the middle management to give them a sense of increased responsibility. Creation of an anonymous complaint box, this would give management a guide as to the current state of mind of the employees.

As work and non-work stress are intertwined, organizations should find ways to help employees relieve non-work stress for instance in MTNN, new fathers are given paternal leave in the early days of the baby’s life, because such people would probably have had little sleep at night due to the new baby crying and he will be unable to function optimally at work the  anyway, so above average industry number of leave days will reduce stress and in turn revamp the trust for the organization that was previously lost after the layoffs.

Many companies are on the right track with various things being put in place as studies into work and non-work stress has increased exponentially in the past few years.

References

Manjoo F. (2013, January 21st). The Happiness Machine, How Google Became A Great Place To Work. Retreived article from http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2013/01/google_people_operations_the_secrets_of_the_world_s_most_scientific_human.html

Gibson J.L., Donnelly J.H. et al. 2012, Organizations Behaviours, Structures, Processes. 14 Pp 194-222

Nielsen N.S. (2011) Organisational Communication to Survivors of Layoffs. Bachelor Thesis Spring Pp 6-30

Mckenna P. J. (2009). Handling The Trauma of Layoffs, Pp 1-9 Retrieved from www.patrickmckenna.com/layoffs