Apple, Palm taking different steps to reduce worker overhead

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Comments

  • Reply 21 of 30
    haggarhaggar Posts: 1,568member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by valanchan View Post


    When companies are able to hire again I wonder who good people would like to work for.



    Depends on how much these people's hours are being cut. Cutting someone from 20 hours a week down to 4 hours a week might be just as bad as a layoff.
  • Reply 22 of 30
    solipsismsolipsism Posts: 25,726member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Haggar View Post


    Depends on how much these people's hours are being cut. Cutting someone's hours from 20 hours down to 4 hours a week might be just as bad as a layoff.



    Worse in many ways. I think you have to be laid off to get unemployment and if the company isn't making their hours worked consistent it could interfere with looking for a real job.
  • Reply 23 of 30
    tbelltbell Posts: 3,146member
    I agree. I am a Mac guy. Bad times or good, I am not buying a PC. I might have to put off a Mac purchase, but eventually, I will pay for the Mac regardless if I can get a cheaper Mac.



    Quote:
    Originally Posted by aplnub View Post


    I have never bought this argument. If that was the case, then explain the consistent increase in sales? Good times or bad, sales will go up and down but I think Apple will maintain prices. It is hard to drop prices on equipment and then explain that to your existing customer base. i.e. iPhone.



    Layoffs may come but who knows, gun and ammo sales are so high right now that industry alone may pull us out of this economy.



  • Reply 24 of 30
    tbelltbell Posts: 3,146member
    Yes, the diversification argument is nice except that the whole entire market has lost just as much. Apple is one of the best performing companies right now and it's stock is being hit just as hard as everybody else.



    Quote:
    Originally Posted by malax View Post


    Let's suppose you make $60K. That means you own something like 500 shares of AAPL that has been worth from $40,000 to $97,500. Methinks you should diversity your portfolio.



  • Reply 25 of 30
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Messiah View Post


    I love how Palm think that they can restructure their way out of this situation.



    It seems to be obvious to everyone else but Palm, that Palm needs to start again from scratch. Until they get the foundation right, they're dead in the water.



    Apple spent the time and the money getting the foundations right... and now they're reaping the rewards...



    Yes, but the question is who should do the restructuring? Apple had a similar experience they were losing market share like no one else, so they also restructured, remember Michael Spindler and Gil Amelio, yet nothing positive happened till Steve Jobs stepped in.
  • Reply 26 of 30
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by JAQ View Post


    The only way the math on this would work out in Apple's favor is if - by putting Geniuses and Creatives on the sales floor - they were also cutting back on the staffing hours at the Genius Bar and Creative Studio. The problem with this strategy is, there's no reason to expect that tech support traffic will drop off due to the economic situation (might even go up if people are more intent on fixing rather than replacing their sick MacPods). The training sessions are already paid for the next year, aren't they? So that traffic wouldn't drop off either.



    So they'd be hurting the quality of their tech and training departments by understaffing them, and they'd be hurting the quality of their sales department by putting trainers and techs to work selling (for which they're overpaid and probably not as good at as an actual salesperson). Seems like it'd be much simpler and safer to just adjust the hours the part-time Specialists are working based on the amount of sales traffic the stores are getting, and leave the parts of the business that are more recession-proof alone.



    I think Apple has a little better intentions, though because the Retail industry in general is just totally shit (ask anyone with any experience as a manager or staff, etc.) I can't see how Apple can get their Retail humming along as well as it has in the current environment.



    I agree that there should be a discussion with the Specialists, a target number of hours for the whole store should be decided upon. Then from this, have a process whereby some full-timers may want to go part-time (happens a lot, people go back to school or other things), and some part-timers may want to go full-time. Inevitably some under-performing staff may have to be asked to cut down their hours.



    Additionally, some intelligent forecasting should be done so that part-time Specialists are scheduled at peak times and rotated off during quieter times of the day/week.



    I agree that Genius should be as untouched as possible. Not that these people are the "chosen ones", but I've seen the *tech, creative and training* aspects of Apple Resellers be cut back drastically during "difficult" times and sales really just go down the toilet.



    Once the air of desperation kicks in at a particular retail operation, that's pretty much the deathblow because it creates a very vicious downward spiral.
  • Reply 27 of 30
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by solipsism View Post


    Worse in many ways. I think you have to be laid off to get unemployment and if the company isn't making their hours worked consistent it could interfere with looking for a real job.



    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Haggar View Post


    Depends on how much these people's hours are being cut. Cutting someone from 20 hours a week down to 4 hours a week might be just as bad as a layoff.



    Certainly good points. However it is interesting to note that there is some leeway as a vast majority of Concierge and Specialist staff are fairly young, say under 25, some are still at college/uni and do several casual jobs over the course of several years.



    I would define the core operations and core revenue driver of the stores to be based on knowledge. That means, Geniuses, Creatives, Business, Trainers, one would hope they would prioritise. (Some areas to lighten a bit IMHO is say at Regent Street London, they have a presentation almost every hour. This could be lightened to every two hours or so.)



    Not that young Concierge and Specialist staff are less worthy, but there is a bit more flexibility there, because while they love to work for Apple Retail, for them, career wise, it is a bit more open. And they are a bit more forgiving so the culture and morale of the store may not suffer too badly.



    To be honest, there would be some Specialist and Concierge staff that may want to leave, or just keep a few hours here and there because they are passionate about Apple. For them, asking for reduced hours, or a resignation, may reflect very badly, or they are just worried about requesting that. So it is an opportunity for these staff to "renegotiate" their working arrangements with Apple.



    Some staff that work say just 6 hours a week, if they are knowledgeable, passionate, and not to disruptive to the full-timers, can contribute greatly. Just a few of these guys/gals on a real busy Saturday can really take the heat off the full-timers.



    F*king with the Genius and Training operations too much can really harm morale and sales, because then the store is competing on hardware specs and design, as opposed to knowledge, value, and experience-based advantages of getting Apple products.



    My two cents (dollars, perhaps).



    PS I know the above sounds good in theory, it can work, but it takes really good common sense, smart retail management to pull off. From what I've seen, Apple Retail is the one most likely that can do it, but, like I said previously, retail is retail is crappy.
  • Reply 28 of 30
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by AppleInsider View Post


    How this pans out is still to be determined. Apple is running trials of this shuffled retail management to learn whether it should expand the reorganization on a broader level or consider alternatives that may include shelving the plans...



    From what I know and from my two rounds of interviews with Apple UK Retail, they have a lot of discussions and meetings, meetings among managers especially, to decide on this kind of stuff.



    It's great that AppleInsider has divulged some details but as AppleInsider mentions these plans will be fairly fluid over the next several months.
  • Reply 29 of 30
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by valanchan View Post


    When companies are able to hire again I wonder who good people would like to work for.



    That's the real killer sometimes, when times are good a lot of places attract and retain good people, and people enjoy working there. When times are bad, that's when things get messy.



    Given these good-times/bad-times cycle is now running almost every 5+ years, due to the interconnected global economy stuff, I too wonder how one, if one has experience, is capable, and intelligent, can navigate the waves of uncertainty.
  • Reply 30 of 30
    With more than 21 billion dollars in the bank. Apple could help their workforce go through this "financial crisis" with more consideration. What would be the economic strain on the retail section of Apple if they would do this? How much money will they really save? Why not cut the high ranking executive bonuses or even a pay cut to help out low salary employes (I'm sure they have enough options to compensate). Apple already pays their employes under the industry standard (for the joy of working for Apple) cutting the hours of part-times to please share holders and maintain their image is a poor solution.



    Grant you Apple is not a charitable organization, they are there to make money but they are not about to go bankrupt either. Are they about to close an Apple Store (that would be a first)? Clean what needs to be cleaned up before reducing your workforce, these are the people meeting, greeting the customers and selling the computers to them. Apple has been paying a multi-million dollar lease for years for an empty space in NYC and who knows what other futile expenses that no-one knows about. BTW who is paying for the maintenance for the G5 (GulfStream)?
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