Management Issues...

Let's assume that you have a business that has turnover of about 5-6 million per year. And your total staff force will be about 30-40 people....You also have been in business for the last 15 years or so...You are thinking of improving your sales and obviously you'll need to employ more skilled employees and open up a new division (department) to ensure that you'll achieved your objective...You will then call up for an interview and someone from a competitor answered your call. He said, in order to beef up the department, he will need a team. In short, he is saying he has to bring his entire team from his current company that consists of 4 skilled workers and 1 support staff. You thought it was a good idea and decided to go ahead with the idea.

Hence, now that you've employ a few 'skilled' workers that you believe that can take the company to a higher level than what you have been used to for the last couple of years. Obviously, for the first few months, you can't expect any improvement or a surge of business from this new departments as your workers are still trying to cope and adapt to their new working environment, culture and ways.

Fast forward to 1 year. From the management reports and accounts, you don't see any significant improvements. The only business that comes from them are the businesses that you've been getting before they came in...On every meeting or review, the same questions has been has ask and obviously the same answers will be heard. Such answers like 'it will take time, it's very difficult to penetrate the market,' are the norm... You then realised that their overheads are now much more than their production. In short, you are starting to make losses month after month.

Losses after losses...you finally instructed the general manager to finalize the plan to ensure the survival of the department. The department is now not self sustaining..in other words the department needs help from the other departments to pay their salaries ..their monthly productions does not justify their high salaries and can only covers about 30-40% of their monthly overheads...you don't need to be a rocket scientist to acknowledge that the department are not doing well...meeting after meetings later,you were shocked when the GM suddenly wrote a resignation letter to you as he has failed in his promise made to you a few years ago...after thinking thoughtfully, you then approved his letter...after a few weeks, his assistant manager then wrote a resignation letter as well...you again approved it....

2-3 months later, after the 'team' left, the department has remained stale...nothing much happen but you still receive businesses for that department in a lesser extent...you thought that you had a team that can finally push your company to a greater heights but unfortunately it was all 'indah khabar dari rupa'...you thought with all their qualifications and experiences, you will at least be on par with your competiors especially in that line on business....at least now, you don't actually incur losses for that department as the production is sometimes 2 or 3 times bigger that it was as compared to some of the TEAM's monthly productions...

YOu then felt happy that you no longer incur losses from that department but you then received 2 letters from the Industrial Relation department stating that 2 of the 4 employees from the TEAM stated that you have unlawfully dismissed them...

Imagine this...they came to you for work and you gave them the work. When they can't perform you ask questions why they can't perform. When you ask them to put out a plan, they wrote in a resignation letter. You then begin to wonder on which part are they unlawfully dismissed?

You then have to go to the Industrial Relation office to offer your explanation. Not once but a few times. In short, your productive working hours are wasted as some of your time are spent answering questions in the IR office. You insisted that what you've done are all according to the country's law and you stand by your decision. They wrote a resignation letter and you accepted it. There are no elements of force what-so-ever when they sign the resignation letters....

Just imagine, these guys went to see you for work and when they work you pay them on time. When things get a little rough, they chickened out and then resigned. For some strange reasons, they decide to get free money by bringing the company to the industrial relations and to some extent, to the court...

You even heard that one of them plan to buy a luxury car with the money that he is going to get from you if he wins the case...

When face a situation like this...how do you react and what will you do?