Fear and loathing at John Lewis as sweeping staff cuts are feared
JOHN Lewis’s management has threatened partners with disciplinary action after a spate of abusive comments on its internal forum as workers brace for sweeping job cuts.
The UK’S largest employee-owned business, which runs John Lewis department stores and Waitrose, said a number of partners had written “unacceptable comments” on its intranet, and warned they would be summoned to meetings with people managers.
The partnership said there was a “significant and understandable strength of feeling about recent announcements but that’s not an excuse for some of the abuse we’ve seen”. It said many comments on its forum were “hurtful and simply unacceptable”, warning employees that bullying, harassment or any offensive conduct would be treated as a disciplinary matter.
The partnership, run by chairman Dame Sharon White, said: “The intranet is not a social media platform. It’s a business channel and should be treated as such by every partner.”
It comes amid frayed relations inside the partnership as Dame Sharon steps up turnaround efforts. The retailer plunged to a £234million loss last year and was forced to scrap staff bonus.
John Lewis has been battling to revive its fortunes through cost-cutting and moves designed to tempt shoppers back into stores. Today, it said it would be slashing hundreds more prices in Waitrose stores to win middle-class customers back from Marks & Spencer. Both Waitrose and M&S now command 3.8 per cent of the grocery market, according to Nielsen IQ data. However, this represents a drop for Waitrose from 3.9 per cent this time last year and a rise for M&S from 3.6 per cent.
Waitrose said it would invest £30million into lowering price of own-brand products. The price cuts will span 200 items across meat, fruit and vegetables, as well as kitchen cupboard staples. The retailer promised a further round of price cuts in the spring.
However, the partnership is looking to strip £600million of costs out of the business on top of the £300m already cut. Bosses are now considering axing 11,000 roles. Dame Sharon and John Lewis Partnership chief executive, Nish Kankiwala, confirmed job losses were likely, telling workers “difficult decisions” needed to be made to protect the partnership’s future. It has added fuel to a mounting backlash from partners who have criticised executives and elected representatives on the internal forums.
In posts seen by The Telegraph, workers have claimed executives are not “standing up for what is right for this business and its people”. Dame Sharon has also come under fire from staff on internal posts. She is due to step down by early next year when her five-year term comes to an end.
One worker wrote: “Under Sharon’s short stewardship she has managed to do so much harm to the business and partners. I really hope that the headhunters that we are utilising now to help choose a new chairman are not the same ones that chose Sharon.”
The latest criticism comes after staff voted in May against Dame Sharon in one of two crucial ballots on her leadership. They backed her in a second vote.
Workers were told last month that redundancy payments were being cut in half. John Lewis reduced its redundancy pay to one week’s pay per year of service, claiming it needed to make the policy “more affordable” and “free up cash”. Staffing accounts for one of John Lewis’s biggest costs. It spent £1.8bn on employees in the last financial year.
The staff changes threaten to spark strike action, with union chiefs over the weekend telling John Lewis it needed to provide answers to workers.
In a letter to Dame Sharon, GMB said it was poised to ballot the retailer’s workers over walkouts. A spokesman for John Lewis said it had received the letter and would reply to the GMB.
‘There is a significant strength of feeling but that is not an excuse for some of the abuse we’ve seen’ ‘I really hope that the headhunters we are utilising are not same ones that chose Sharon’