Severance pay, retirement: Twice as many employees want to leave SAP as planned
Reports say SAP aims to cut 2600 jobs in Germany via severance and early retirement. More employees have signed up for the program than initially planned.
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The severance and early retirement program, with which SAP plans to cut around 2,600 jobs in Germany alone, is reportedly very popular with the workforce: as reported by the Handelsblatt newspaper, citing company sources, around 5,300 employees had signed up for the golden handshake by the deadline at the end of May. Of these, around 60 percent are said to have registered for early retirement, with the remainder wanting to leave the company with severance pay.
SAP would neither confirm nor deny the figure. "Due to the attractiveness of both programs, we have seen a very high level of interest, as expected," said a spokesperson. The job cuts are part of a "transformation" that CEO Christian Klein has prescribed for the software company: 8000 jobs are to be cut worldwide, reportedly around 2600 in Germany. However, new jobs are to be created to the same extent. SAP is to focus more strongly on "growth areas" such as artificial intelligence and be trimmed for greater efficiency and profit.
The redundancies are to be voluntary and without compulsory redundancies. It remains to be seen whether SAP will go even further with the job cuts considering demand. Handelsblatt claims to have heard from management circles that there is "some scope for deeper cuts".
Frustration over office duty
On June 17, all those who have registered are to be informed of the status of their registration. If the company makes an offer, a termination agreement would then have to be negotiated with the employee. According to SAP, the company will examine the situation based on "objective" criteria, which have also been agreed with the works' council beforehand. Business risks, such as the "loss of critical know-how", are to be avoided. "We are therefore unlikely to be able to make an offer to all interested parties, as our program is based on mutual agreement," said the spokesperson.
SAP is not giving any figures on the amount of the offers. According to reports, employees with 20 or more years of service could receive a special payment of 33.5 months' salary. An additional incentive to leave SAP could also be the pent-up frustration among the workforce about CEO Klein's course. At the beginning of the year, for example, he caused angry protests with the introduction of a three-day office requirement.
(axk)
