The job cuts begin?

According to Forth One, a local radio station, my employer has begun job cuts. The story is here below and can be found at the Forth One website:

Forth News can reveal Edinburgh financial giant Hbos is axing 90 jobs across the UK. Around half the affected positions will go in the capital. The cutbacks are in the bank’s corporate division which employs around 1,000 people. It is part of an on-going review. A spokesman for the bank said: “Like all debt providers, Bank of Scotland Corporate constantly reviews its operations to ensure that it has the right level of staff to meet the needs of the business. We have decided to reduce the staffing levels by around 90 posts in various locations across the UK. The relevant teams have seen significant growth in recent years and currently employ around 1,000 people.”

It has been a strange day at work. If you get made redundant, or put at risk of redundancy, a standard process for any major employer, particularly a bank, is as follows: the employee is called to the top floor (usually by being called on the phone by senior management) and meets with human resources and a senior manager. A standard script is read out verbatim and the employee signs a piece of paper. Then the employee leaves and is offered the opportunity to leave the building and return later to get belongings, or as is the more normal route, the opportunity to return to their desk and collect their personal belongings whilst under the close scrutiny and supervision of a senior manager. The employee is then walked to the front door at which point they return their pass and equipment. Pretty grim, pretty impersonal but absolutely consistent with the letter of the law. Job cuts are never good, never unavoidable, and it’s one of the worst things you have to do as a senior manager.

I still have my job. The story above would suggest that the impact of the credit crisis is getting closer and closer to home all the time. Grim times.