11:53 pm, December 19, 2011
THERE’S a time and a place to deliver bad news – and the week before Christmas is categorically NOT it.
Renault really dropped an almighty clanger on Monday when it announced to the press it would be chopping half its model range, a third of its dealers and slashing its sales forecasts for 2012.
I haven’t really got a problem with all of that. Times change, products fall in and out of favour, and brands lose their appeal. Sadly, Renault has suffered the feat of all three.
What I have got a problem with is the fact it delivered the news just a few days before Christmas. And before you tell me ‘that’s business’, well hear me out – it’s quite frankly not ‘business’ at all.
Business is about personalities, it’s about relationships, it’s about lives – and there are now a damn sight more people out there entering the Christmas period with an almighty cloud over the heads.
CHRISTMAS CLANGER
Why should that matter? Well, it’s because people make a business. Those dealers, the sales people who’ve worked damn hard selling products that aren’t simply up to the job, even the valeters who’ve worked hard keeping the shapely-bottomed cars clean have just been dumped on from an almighty height.
And it’s those people who now have to contend with a Christmas worrying about what’s next. What difference would a few days have made – why not deliver the hammer blow on the 27th? It would still be pretty crappy but at least those involved could have enjoyed a few sherries without worrying.
You’ve probably guessed this news has struck a bit of a bit of a chord with me. That’s because I’ve worked for an employer that – probably because the management didn’t think about the actual people on the ground working for ‘the company’ – decided to deliver redundancy news just days before Christmas.
Three years on the trot.
Have these people got no idea of the effect that has on people?
I don’t have a problem with Renault axing the Laguna, the Wind (good riddance) the Espace or the Kangoo (car version, always remember, the car version). What I do have a problem with is telling your dealer network – mostly it seems via the power of the press as the ones we spoke to didn’t even know anything about it – that they’ll be out of jobs in a few months.
The news was sad, yes, but not unavoidable. The timing, however, was heartless – and it doesn’t matter how big your company is, there’s always place for a bit of common courtesy.
