New Orwellian word
Sad news today of a further 466 job losses (more “not bad news actually”) with PPCS closing its Oringi meatworks.
But how is this for Orwellian double-speak. They are not “down-sizing” but “right-sizing”:
Chief executive Keith Cooper said the proposed closure was part of the company’s “right-sizing programme” – aimed at aligning the company’s processing capacity to current and projected livestock availability.
Can we hunt down and slaughter the person who came up with that term.
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Tags: Orwellian
May 13th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
Can we hunt down and slaughter the person who came up with that term.
I think 466 people are onto that right now….
May 13th, 2008 at 2:53 pm
Ah capitalism, you are all heart.
May 13th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
Damn you, Bevan, that’s exactly what I was going to say. I’m hardly surprised at the closure, in all honesty. Given that there is another works just up the road at Takapau, I suppose it makes sense for the company to consolidate its operations. It’s going to gut DV, though. Look at the state of Patea these days.
May 13th, 2008 at 2:57 pm
from wordspy.com – Roy S Roberts
“Earliest Citation:
“‘Downsizing’ is the term commonly used to describe strategic corporate cutbacks. But Roy S. Roberts, vice president of personnel administration for General Motors Corp., prefers a different word. He terms the monstrous task of trimming GM’s salaried staff by 25% ‘rightsizing,’ contending that it will make the automaker leaner, meaner, and more competitive.”
—John H. Sheridan, “A matter of perspective,” Industry Week, January 4, 1988 “
May 13th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Sonic … your solution please in the face of dwindling stock numbers.
May 13th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
check The Dilbert Principle. I think it has it in there somewhere.
May 13th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
“Ah capitalism, you are all heart.”
What do you suggest, sonic?
PPCS is not a charity and needs to do whatever it takes to survive in the marketplace, even taking the difficult measure of laying hundreds of workers off.
The reality of the capitalist marketplace appears to elude you. Do you believe that everything ought to be subsidised, propped by the state, and kept afloat by the taxpayer?
I suggest you get out and earn a living before making those comments. Yes, there is a real demanding world beyond the ivory towers of academia.
May 13th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
I remember the day they shut Kaiapoi and Ocean Beach sheep slaughter chains. Big blow for the workers and their families especially the children. Oh well such is life. Sheep go and tit pullers replace them. How much is the price of milk again and forget a leg of lamb as you need a mortgage to buy either or.
May 13th, 2008 at 3:15 pm
Sonic
It happened under your govt Sonic…what say you about it?
May 13th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
PPCS itself needs to be right-sized. Apparently there’s a large investor in the Canterbury region who’s considering yanking their chain to choking point to force them to get into the 21st century.
May 13th, 2008 at 3:41 pm
Off Topic
I have just watched a great speech from NZ’s next PM (John Key) in the house, a speech full of vision and direction.
Cullens response is sad, he is red faced, bitter and angry, the body of the speech was made up of the usual gutter personal attacks and mixture of mad panic and utter lies.
May 13th, 2008 at 3:41 pm
Great minds Bearhunter
May 13th, 2008 at 3:47 pm
Perhaps Sonic would have preferred to be deemed a “strategic asset” and purchased at three times its value by the socialists?
May 13th, 2008 at 3:50 pm
Nice-2-see Keith Cooper is a man who calls a spade a digitaly operated earth tilling device.
May 13th, 2008 at 3:58 pm
Ah capitalism, you are all heart.
Yes because propping up unprofitable factories makes perfect business sense…
Take your pick Sonic, 466 job losses now, or four times that later.
May 13th, 2008 at 4:01 pm
Under chronics government this is what we get and his answer is more of it.
The only thing worse than a fuckwit is a complete fuckwit.
May 13th, 2008 at 4:06 pm
It’s always a cause for celebration to hear of a slaughterhouse closing down.
May 13th, 2008 at 4:34 pm
Ah capitalism you’re all heart.
Thanks sonic, we all knew that you would recognise in the end that us capitalists are the more caring in the political world. Hows the economy in that socialist heaven Venezuela going these days?
Your countryman Gordon Brown seems to be suffering at the polls as your other countryman seem to be waking up to what it seems you now know. Capitalism is all heart and far better than selfish socialism
May 13th, 2008 at 4:49 pm
I see Captain Crab still does not understand sarcasm.
May 13th, 2008 at 5:38 pm
Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit-Oscar Wilde.
Must be a socialist thing sonic, being a low form and all
May 13th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
Orwellian?!? Surely, the Chief Exec of the meat works (being a good capitalist, self-made man and all) is not a cynical faux-socialist suppressor of the people?
This is just management-speak. Have you tried to do any business with an Australian lately? They breathe that sort of stuff…
May 13th, 2008 at 5:57 pm
Manolo asks:
and then Buggerlugs points out:
From what I remember from my days editing “Straight Furrow” PPCS wasn’t exactly a model of productive efficiency and lean, efficient management. But in those days commodity prices were high enough to allow inefficiencies to go unaddressed while still creating profits.
I accept that things may have changed since – this was a few years ago now. However, in answer to Manolo’s question I might postulate an answer involving a cleanout starting not at the bottom but at the top; the investment in efficient processing chains (which might have seen gradual lay-offs but not the wholesale dumping of another 466 people onto the job market at one time) and a consequent managing of shareholder expectations so that they would not scream for Mr Cooper’s head if dividends slowly declined. Still, better one executive with the vital skill of spin-doctoring survives than 466 working families have food on the table, I suppose.
Hopefully that Canterbury investor to whom Buggerlugs refers yanks that chain hard enough to choke off the management who’ve let this happen so as to protect their own positions.
May 13th, 2008 at 6:03 pm
Orwellian? Not at all.
The term ‘Orwellian’, as I understand it, when applied to language means something sinister, with political over-tones and actually saying the opposite of what it means.
The phrase ‘right-sizing’ may well be a neologism (I’ve not seen it before but it may have been around a while) and in this case is sounds quite correct. It’s not in the least Orwellian. The company is, sadly, making itself the right size to suit the market conditions.
May 13th, 2008 at 6:34 pm
“The only thing worse than a fuckwit is a complete fuckwit.”
That’s a real ‘keeper’ from the Muzz-meister. Do you mind if I quote this, in future? I’ll attribute, bien sur.
May 13th, 2008 at 6:41 pm
This closure is just one of many we will see over the next 12 months. Permanent livestock reductions in sheep and cattle, especially of breeding stock will see a rapid ‘right’ sizing in the face of mass dairy conversions (a two year waiting list if you want a milking shed built in Canterbury!!) and the insanely overvalued Kiwi dollar.
The other thing is PPCS has had a debt problem for years, the interest yield on their bonds is among the highest because their considered among the riskiest to lend to these days.
Servicing costs of PPCS debt were cited by Alliance directors as a major reason to reject the latest merger proposals which was a great shame.
I can’t help wondering if Alliance simply intends to wait for PPCS to hit the wall and coming begging to the Alliance board for a merger/takeover on whatever terms Alliance wants. Considering the bitter corporate and personal hatred between the two over past years it wouldn’t surprise me. Either way more layoffs in the meat industry will be due this year. Not good for meat processing workers affected but in the long term very good for the industry as whole.
And ‘Right sizing’ is the right phrase because right now PPCS is totally the wrong size.
May 13th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
Yes good call sonic – it is an indictment of the uncaring face of capitalism.
However, if I may opine –
We must be thankful though, that after nine years of Labour Party rule, buttressed by the support of the union movement (paid for by worker subscriptions) that those poor people who are about to lose their livelihoods will be legally able to access appropriate redundancy payments and maybe be able to invest that into their futures. Coupled with the sterling work that the left-leaning socialist orientated labour government has done to encourage workers to get involved as stake-holders, in their own industries and thus maintain an investment in their communities that otherwise would disintegrate when the main industry in the area folds.
I mean imagine what a shit storm it would have been if those gravy-sucking capitalists in the National Party had been in charge.
By the way how do those dole-payments under the current Labour Administration compare to what they would have been under Ruthenasia?
Thank goodness the Government and unions are there to help those poor unwashed illiterates fill out their WINZ applications.
Because they fucking care….
Well we were talking ‘Orwellian’…………
May 13th, 2008 at 9:12 pm
Heh, Sonic just confirmed again the leftist strategy of making statements that can’t be backed up “humorous” in retrospect.
May 13th, 2008 at 9:16 pm
Twenty five years ago the big works in Hawkes Bay were shut as smaller, more modern plants like Oringi took over the processing. Now we are seeing the same thing all over again. Waingawa, Longburn, Whakatu, Tomoana,Feilding all closed over the years, as stock numbers dwindled and plants became too expensive to operate. There will be more closures as the stock numbers fall further. Where sheep used to graze in the Takapau area we now have dairy farms. Hawkes Bay and Wairarapa are growing grapes, olives and all sorts of other things. The hills grow trees not sheep. the numbers are not there for the processors or the farmers.
Dannevirke also has a small Alliance plant which is more modern than Oringi, perhaps some will get work there.
Now as for “rightsizing” I think that is when the calibre matches the barrel.
May 13th, 2008 at 9:26 pm
While all the leftoids are making their usual stupid comments, one must bear in mind that PPCS is not some large capitalist entity sucking the life from the worker, and there are no dividends to care about. Yes, that’s right, PPCS is a CO-OPERATIVE ! A farmer co-op true, but a co-op none the less.
It doesn’t pay dividends in the normal sense but normally attempts to pay out any surpluses via the purchases it makes of stock (generally speaking). PPCS is also the market participant that has been cutting prices overseas and undermining the other suppliers attempts to improve returns. It has done so because (as Richard Hurst points out) it is under considerable financial pressure. PPCS rather unwisely expanded by buying out Richmonds a few years ago, taking on considerable debt to do so. It has too many plants in the East Coast area, and Oringi was the smaller and less efficient one. It could not easily be kept open as there will be insufficient stock numbers over the next few years to be processed in the area, and there are several other larger plants in the area, principally PPCS’s Takapau plant (2 x the size), Alliance’s at Dannevirke, and also Bernard Matthews at Feilding and Waipukurau, let alone Anzco at Marton, Affco at Wairoa, and others.
The great Meat Co merger ran into a number of problems. Putting Alliance and PPCS together is probably not too hard, they’re both co-operatives and as such there is no shareholder monetary interests to consider. But adding in Anzco and Affco would mean buying out the shareholders for cash as they would have no interest I would think in receiving non-tradeable co-op “shares”, and I doubt that the co-op “owners” want to turn the organisation away from being a co-op. And where was that cash to come from, I doubt that Banks at the moment want to throw more money at a marginally profitable industry with poor prospects for the immediate future, and no prospects at all if the ridiculous carbon trading scheme is implemented as proposed.
Sad, but this closure was inevitable, and there will be more in the South Island, and maybe more in the North. Bad luck for everyone who worked their. there will be work for probably 50 – 75% at the other works around, which would mean more travel for most, but some people may have to relocate and change careers. Even the local Meat Workers Union isn’t really fighting this, something had to go, and Oringi was the obvious first choice.
May 13th, 2008 at 10:21 pm
“Ah capitalism, you are all heart.”
Aaahh.. the Soviet Union.. sure showed em how to do it there didn’t you Sonik?
May 14th, 2008 at 6:43 am
There’s no big deal about the term “right sizing”. It’s just another one of thousands of naff corporate euthemisms and cliches that are all part and parcel of everyday managerial Bull Shit Bingo.
I’m only surprised by the fact that the CEO in question would use such an outdated expression. “Right sizing” had its brief trot across the pages of consultants’ derivative lip-synching reports way, way back in the early 1990′s. But I guess there’re a bit slow down there in Ashburton and are still getting through the first couple of chapters of Champy’s Corporate Re-engineering [available for $4.99 in the bargin books bin at The Warehouse the last time I saw it].
And for a balanced perspective on organisational bull shit, let’s give a hearty cheer for: “Closing the Gaps”, “Knowledge Wave Economy”, “Jobs Jolt”, and “Carbon Neutrality”.
May 14th, 2008 at 6:52 am
More underskilled NZ management talking shite. Nice word play DPF, hunt down and slaughter – meatworks, slaughter.
Most likely to be a victim of the obscenely high NZ dollar, perpetrateted by Cullen and that Clark person.
May 14th, 2008 at 8:32 am
I find it rather ironic that Cullen has made a reputation out of being the bitchiest straight man ever, but he comes over like a maiden aunt forced to listen to gangsta rap at the merest taste of his own medicine. And how many people around here bitch and moan that Key and English aren’t feral enough?