Bell Canada: "Lean and mean" like Gordon Gekko

Michael Douglas in his Gordon Gekko role.

It's depressing this summer, the litany of plant closures and job losses, even the latest news that housing sales are falling across the country. Are you thinking this is what 1928 must have felt like?

At least a big corporation like BCE Inc. knows how to put the right spin on the loss of 2,500 jobs to appeal to a crowd that thinks newer, slicker, faster is always the way to go. "They are sending a message they intend to be lean and mean," industry analyst Carmi Levy told business reporter Tony Wong about yesterday's layoff announcement. Sounds like the kind of thing buyout champ Gordon Gekko (played by Michael Douglas) would could have said in the 1987 flick, Wall Street. Gekko's credo of "greed is good" pretty much summed up the decade.

Are we really back there?

To decode Bell's message, the company essentially appealed to its customers to believe they'll be better off with the layoffs. As Bell stressed, "non-management, front-line jobs" won't be affected. "Leaner and meaner" means better service for you. Now, putting aside the question of whether the public buys the idea they'll be better served by the dumping of 2,500 jobs, consider the underlying tone of a corporate message that had to have been worked out after long strategy sessions by high-priced help. BCE is betting people care more about their own lives — how's this going to affect me? — than the employees and their families. Maybe it's true, one observes sadly, but it's a rather distasteful message for a giant corporation like BCE, now owned by a group headed by the Ontario Teachers Pension Fund, to be sending out. I thought the me-me-me times were over.

Moreover, are we supposed to care less about management jobs than we do about auto workers getting the boot this summer? Oh well. As new BCE Inc. CEO George Cope so delicately put it: "It's always difficult to see colleagues depart, but these changes are absolutely necessary."

Hey, life goes on.

Comments

[love_life]

I would like to start off with saying that for everyone who complains about bad service dosen't realize that maybe just MAYBE they need to take another look at things in life. For all the bad service you say you got did you ever get good service.. yes forall the people you say are lazy and dont know what they are doing, do YOU know everything at your job? My point is those very people on he other end that is being hounded on are people.. everyday people that you see in the car next to you or on the bus or street for that matter. People forget that that very person on the other end that yu want them to help you are people not better no less then you. As someone who used to work the front lines this is what i think. Do you have bad days? do you have things you cannot control happen in your life? I can bet my life you do. so just think twice at those "lazy" people who you like to yell at and scream at.. just so everyone knows the people you speak with in customer service ID NOT do whatever problem you have to your phone they simply answer that call that comes in. See how you feel after taking about 40 calls in one shift answering the same thing over and over. People these days need to grow up and stop being rude and jerky. so next time when you call into a call centre India or not be respectful for that person on the other end could one day be someone you know.

[...pat.]

Lean, mean, and nasty.
Yup.
And I look, and think what are my choices? Telus has already proven themselves to be creeps when it comes to treating employees well (to wit: strike out west, temporary refusal to carry DNS for the striking employees website) and frankly, Rogers unethical telephone marketing methods dissuade me from using them.

What's an ethical choice?