Bad-news message

Name
Instructor
Course
Date
Subject: Introduction of the Furlough Program
Dear Mr. John,
The CEO and the Board of Directors wish to appreciate you your diligence, hard work and the commitment you have shown to the company since you joined us. You have been an invaluable employee and we have seen you grown in your career. Moreover, we appreciate the great working relationship that you have developed with other employees at different levels. We too hope that we have been of benefit to you and our relationship has brought immense mutual benefits.
In light of the above and following intense deliberations with the entire leadership of the company, we wish to alter some things in terms of employment so that our cooperation may continue and grow. Owing to the recent economic downturn, the company has been compelled to make some hard choices so that it remains profitable and grows. We believe that our growth brings immense benefits to among others the employees who get to enjoy improved remunerations in a sustainable manner. With this in mind and with the best interest of all stakeholders at heart, we are compelled to lower our expenses and one of the areas we target to do so is in the human resource department. Since we value our employees and consider them the greatest asset, we won’t lay off workers we will instead adopt the Furlough Program.
Here’s how the Furlough Program is going to work. In itself, the Furlough Program means a “leave of absence” which is unpaid. Furlough Programs are always a safe, sensitive and considerate ways in place of laying off workers.

Furloughs are widely used in the private and public sectors whenever the revenues or the projected incomes fail to match the expenses. In our case, we had the option of laying off 20 percent of all employees to ensure that we remain profitable but we will instead adopt the Furlough Program where we shall reduce the number of working days from five to four days per week. The departments will rotate the days off among their staff to ensure that all days from Monday through to Fridays are adequately covered. It is mandatory that employees agree to take one complete day off and to attend to work for four days.
The following are some of the benefits of the Furlough Program in regard to our current scenario. The first is that everyone gets to keep their job only that you will make lesser money from this job. The scenario of a layoff is incomparable because you would lose the right to recall and there is a minimal expectation of the job returning. We believe that the one day off per week can be put to the invaluable development of talents, time with family or even taking up another job or simply relaxing to recharge and perform at a heightened level once you resume work. We appreciate that the reduced income could have a significant negative impact on your life and for this, we offer our apologies and ask for your understanding. To reiterate my earlier statement, our company seeks to grow so that all the stakeholders can benefit and as such the actions called upon in this letter are purely meant to be in the best interest of all stakeholders.

The management wishes to clarify the following issues. We will continue to support teamwork at the workplace and will ensure that the Furlough program does not derail teamwork but that teams remain intact and should there be members absent, then the work will proceed as usual with the support from other equally able temporary replacements. We also wish to clarify that we have though the program through and seen that it will address the issues troubling the company. As such, we categorically state that we have not started this program as a softer way to bring about layoffs in the coming future. For own we wish to have all our employees focused on maximum productivity any time they are at work. We would also like to state that the company may on very rare cases ask some employees to attend to work on their off days. This may happen due to unforeseen circumstances and work surges. Whenever, some employees are to be assigned work on their off days, then the selection of such employees shall be made purely on merit, competency and experience and never on biases.

There will be further communication through the departmental heads on the way the work schedule is arranged so that it will be largely agreeable. I urge you to offer your input in the upcoming departmental meeting where you will be further engaged in charting the way forward because your input and collaboration in this matter is important. Although the decision to adopt the Furlough Program as outlined above is final, we believe that your input in the implementation of the program is also critical. Thank you for your understanding of the issues stated herein and for your potential cooperation on the above issue.
Yours Faithfully,
The CEO.