If you don’t have slack you can’t cut it
I checked out the PFW in Progress podcast for the first times in several weeks – my previous routine of listening to the show regularly having been disrupted by the kind of events life sometimes throws at you – and quickly learned that the cuts down at Gillette Stadium that were announced a month ago didn’t leave the PFW crew untouched. Michael Parente, who replaced Tom Casale, was laid off, as were a couple of other people who had contributed in various ways to the PFW in Progress podcast. I’ll miss all three, especially Gary Grodacki who often produced the best jokes on the show (sample: “There’s nothing wrong with me, I’m just tired of the incompetence” when needled by the show’s host). You can listen to the first post-layoff show here where the move is referred to as “a shock, “not fun” and “not good.”
The lay off of Parente may hold a lesson for middle managers everywhere. Parente replaced Tom Casale who left for a job out in the Nevada desert. Had Casale not left, another writer, Erik Scalavino would likely have been on the chopping block since he would have been the last man hired. Now, if the Patriots had not filled the vacancy left by Casale, would Scalavino have been spared or would upper management still have required a head count reduction? I don’t know the answer, of course, but, well, adding a replacement did leave Parente’s boss with an easy cut to make (I mean easy in the strictest bean-counting sense, I can’t imagine that it is emotionally easy to lay off an underling, especially one you have hired yourself).
The National Football League itself announced yesterday that the organization is reducing its head count by 14%. Farther down the ladder, The Arena Football League may suspend its 2009 season or fold altogether. The league had seemingly been building momentum over the last few years but in hindsight it was probably just benefiting from the halo effect of easy money sloshing around, a side show to the housing boom, if you will [December 15 update: It's official, the Arena Football League is suspending its 2009 season according to a statement on the league's web site:
“Owners, however, recognize that, especially in light of the current unprecedented economic climate, the AFL, as a business enterprise, needs to be restructured if it is to continue to provide its unique brand of this affordable, fan-friendly sport.”
].
The United Football League claims to be on schedule to launch its inaugural 2009 season. We’ll see about that.
