KESC - finding new answers to staff overload

It would be recalled that some months back, a great hue and cry was raised following the removal from service of some 4,500 employees by the KESC. In fact, such was the impact of the power utility's decision to do away with the services of such a large number of its workers that it became a worthy cause for various political parties which promptly jumped on to the bandwagon and became sympathisers of the sacked KESC employees overnight.
There are chances that such a scenario may be repeated very soon as there are indications that the KESC is again toying with the idea of removing no less than 4,000 of what it describes as its 'non-core' employees whose services it does not need for all practical purposes. The company says that since these workers fall in categories such as bill distributors, junior office assistants, office attendants, drivers, sanitary workers, security guards and other staff, there is really no place for them in the company. In fact, rather than adding to the company's standards of efficiency, their presence leads to inefficiencies, both in terms of economy and customer service.
Before the KESC was privatised some years back, it had functioned in the public sector and this was a major reason why it had become the proverbial white elephant that feeds and fattens itself on public money but has nothing to offer in return. The way political dispositions are, successive governments had continued to over-stretch the utility's resources by overloading it with uncalled for and unnecessary appointments at all cadre levels.
In this day and age of manpower optimisation, things came to a point that the utility had at least four employees in its ranks vying for every single function. The appointment spree was arrested when the company was privatised in 2006 but enough damage had been done by then. If the utility is again planning to offload as many as 4,000 employees in one go, it is doing so to 'right size' itself so that it can become an economically viable commercial entity in the private sector - a service company that seeks to provide its customers with the level of service they demand - and deserve.
It has been reliably learnt that instead of taking the previous route of striking out all by itself and again facing a severe public blowback, this time the KESC has sought the permission of the Sindh High Court to launch its severance scheme. Another judicious step that the KESC has taken is that it has invited representatives of the Collective Bargaining Agent (CBA), to study the severance package from the point of view of the company employees. The positive upshot of this approach would be that with the CBA in a more understanding position, the affected employees would already be aware as to the details of the severance package and their reaction would not be as violent as it was on the previous occasion. It can also be anticipated that the CBA would serve to educate the affected employees as to the substantial benefits that the company is offering to them as a part of its latest severance scheme - something that hardly any other company offers when it removes workers.
How important it is for KESC to offload the non-core segment of its employees can be gauged from the fact that despite all its financial woes, it is spending a substantial amount of over Rs 5.35 billion to help the employees settle down in their lives once they are asked to leave the company. Each of the 4,000 individuals will be paid upfront a gross amount of Rs 700,000 at the lower end and Rs 4,735,000 at the upper. The severance package has been designed to provide maximum financial benefits to the outgoing employees. This means the company is offering an ex-gratia payment of four basic salaries plus one basic salary to every employee for each of their remaining years of service. Those between 58 to 60 years of age would be paid one basic salary for each remaining month of their service. The company has also kept a provision of leave encashment, medical allowance, free electricity entitlement monetization (calculated for the next five years) plus provident fund and gratuity.
It needs to be understood, however, that after seeking due permission from the Sindh High Court, involving the CBA and probably bringing some of the key political players on board, this time the KESC will not stop and will go ahead with the retrenchments as it has every right to do so under the law.
In the event that the planned severance campaign goes through without many hiccups and is successful in achieving its desired targets in terms of optimising financial resources, besides improving the internal work environment and raising customer service standards, it will set an important precedent for many other entities in the private and public sector that are burdened with similar problems of financial overload caused by unnecessary overstaffing.