Christopher D. Lowe

I’ve noticed a trend lately, which is a bit disturbing. With so many out of work in Grand Bahama, people inquiring about jobs has increased tremendously, to quite a few per day.

What is disturbing is this:

When told we are not hiring, or do not have any openings at this time, I get the distinct feeling that, I’m thought to be lying.

That I have, hidden in the back, all sorts of coveted jobs that I’m denying to each person inquiring.

The eyes narrow, the wheels are turning, and I feel guilty and very troubled all at once.

I am not trying to make light of this, I think it is a serious situation.

You see, Business is not conducted to create jobs. I know this is always the government aim (at least the stated objective), but any given business has a certain productivity to accomplish. In order for the endeavour to “pay” for all employed/concerned, certain efficiencies must take place. All the money the company is paying to individuals for their time, must be time spent getting the job done.

Every employee, supplier, owner, customer, is expecting to “profit” from their trade or interaction.

If it were not for this fact, everyone would simply sit around doing nothing, making unemployment the objective…the desired objective.

But, as we have seen, for as long as I remember, job creation is the purpose, the objective of government and those who are dependent upon them.  It pervades our psyche to the core, which results in this undercurrent of suspicion that something is being withheld from the individual seeking a job.

The minute I start adding people to the payroll, and have no role for them to fill, I am jeopardizing the existing morale, productivity, and the very existence of the company and all those who depend on it if the practice continues.

Bear in mind also, that if the company is growing, thriving, succeeding, the addition of more manpower to the workforce is inevitable.

Why?

Because one core fact has been forgotten: Business has got to be intrinsically sensible if it is to succeed over any appreciable amount of time, for the sake of all involved.

Hiring for the sake of hiring is not sensible in the slightest.

It is doing a disservice to the unemployed as much as it is a disservice to those already gainfully occupied.

I figure if things get much worse, we will hear talk from those in lofty places suggesting that employers should take on more people in these hard times.

In fact, I have heard it said already but not by any Business persons. Only by those who’s priority is not productivity, but the creation of jobs.

The very practice in the public sector that is partly responsible for the mess we now find ourselves in.