McDonald’s tells staff to work from home to fire them virtually
Burger giant, McDonald’s, took the cowardly option, by asking staff to work from home this week between Monday-Wednesday, so it could fire people virtually. According to a report that first appeared in The Wall Street Journal, an internal email was sent to office-based staff requesting that they work from home and cancel all in-person meetings as it started to “communicate key decisions related to roles and staffing levels across the organization.” The firm is reportedly undergoing a big reorganization and growth plan (dubbed ‘Accelerating the Arches 2.0’), and this week individuals found out whether they’d be let go or not, or be moved to new teams. The aim of the restructure, said CEO Chris Kempczinski, in his email to staff, was to enable the company to “move faster as an organization, while reducing our global costs and freeing up resources to invest in our growth.” It added: “We will look to our strategy and our values to guide how we reach those decisions and support every impacted member of the company.” It is thought McDonald’s employs around 200,000 people in its corporate and other offices and company-owned restaurants. The ‘virtual’ layoffs follows a demand last week by Google staff to be laid off more humanely, and for any layoffs to be done in-person.