CALIFORNIA – Hewlett-Packard has announced plans to shed 9,000 jobs over three years by initiating a company-wide cull of employees.
The massacre will begin ‘soon’ officials confirmed Monday. “We’re looking at mid-level executives all the way down to the mail room staff. Pretty much anyone slow enough get caught may find their lives and position within the company at risk.”
The company said net loss of life worldwide would total 9,000.
The latest job losses represents a growing trend after 500 people were shed at Wendy’s last year to make patty for burgers.
HP, the world’s largest technology company by sales, says the initiative came from the need to increase motivation and the desire to “test the new meat grinder accounting finally green-lighted.”
In a statement designed at explaining the decision and giving employees time to mentally prepare, the company said the shake-up would make annual gross savings of about $1bn and net savings “after selling on the body parts in a range between $500m and $700m.”
‘We’re putting the laughter into slaughter’
Some employees were understandably worried about coming into work since the news broke: “Why are they doing this to us? I have a wife and two kids. Please…don’t do this,” pleaded long-time employee Ron Slater who admitted the news was affecting his performance at work, ironically making him even more likely to be included in the cull.
When hearing of similar plans to cut 1,300 jobs in the UK, employee union Unite branded the news ‘butchery’, saying HP appeared hell-bent on killing off its highly skilled workforce for no good reason.
Marcela Perez de Alonso, head of Human Resources said that description was ‘largely accurate’, but claimed it necessary to streamline operations. De Alonso did admitted that “it’s easy to get carried away sometimes, but we’ll stop at 9000. Honest.”
HP’s stock price rose 12% as investors showed support for the cost-cutting measures.
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