Back to Dear Lucy homepageI run a PR agency and I am trying to cut £300,000 off my salary bill. I could do this in one swoop by axing one of my “stars” – a man who has worked here longer than I have and who has some great client relationships (though some of them are in such trouble they may not survive). He is charismatic and quite difficult and will not go quietly. For the same money, though, I could axe six or seven more junior people, which might be easier politically. Yet some of them are talented, and the loss of so many will put an intolerable strain on everyone else. Any ideas?
Chief executive, male, 41
Lucy’s answer
Which is worth more: a star or seven grunts? There is no answer to this question in the abstract. If the star in question brings in enough business he is worth more; otherwise he isn’t.
However, most stars are not as bright as they are cracked up to be. The boom years have encouraged us to believe that the workforce is divided into stars and everyone else. In reality the difference between the two is more murky.
In your shoes I’d definitely keep the seven grunts. I get the idea that you do not like your star much, so the recession offers you an excuse to do what you might have wished to do all along.
I am not sure I like him much either: it’s just about OK in a boom to be “quite difficult” when you are earning 300,000,but there is no excuse in a recession to earn that much money unless one’s behaviour is quite impeccable. As he is only “one of” your stars, it sounds as if you will be left with better behaved ones in your firmament once his light is put out.
You say some of the juniors are smart and getting rid of them would put too much pressure on those remaining. This suggests your agency still has plenty of work. If you have talented people to do that work, why get rid of them?
Most businesses cut too many jobs in recessions. They waste money on redundancy payments, weaken the business and then have to hire people back who were less good than the ones they expensively fired.
Assuming you have done all the other things to cut costs – closed your expensive offices, eliminated bonuses and so on – you should put out your star at once. Comfort yourself with the fact that you have ruined only one person’s Christmas. By cutting the grunts, you would have ruined half a dozen more.
