Now,lets be sensible enough n get to the botom of this guys. Saf has neva 'downsized' workforce n 'merged' its depatments since inception. Do we jus assume bob is laying off jus a few staff to hav diner at his place then he reeinstates them in a wks time? Cmon! Look up! The sky is darkenin. N anyone whos nt hearin the word 'BUSSINESS' for the first time knws tooo well wat ths means... STORM

Restructuring frankly means to cut off some slack. Some posts will be lost. Downsizing or rightsizing all lead to the same station - job loss.

Now looking forward, the board of cck want the ceo out - no contract renewal. I guess the price war & constant loggerheads with ndemo & some operators, overcooked his goose. Read here - http://www.businessdaily...4/-/eo20uc/-/index.html

No wonder the strange demand for safcom share. Rebound should target 4.40.

With waweru's likely out I wonder what will be airtel's response...

I like drama and a good fight

Well most Telcos after start-up restructure/downsize every 3 years this is done silently behind the scenes. Kencell/celtel/zain has done it 3 to 4 times, telkom its known, Yu has done it to some positions not massively but outsourced fully its custcare iko talk of doing it on IT&network dept. Safcom was the remaining company and this was bound to happen... sharp Telco employees know this very well thats why the keep moving and asking for high salos

Hatumtoi rangi. We all realise he is a serious and a seasoned contributor to Wazua but that does not make him infallible.

I particularly remember him stating confidently sometime back on a Nakumatt thread that John Harun Mwau, despite what has been in the public domain, "OWNS ZERO SHARES IN NAKUMATT".

You are wrong on this one. There was once a division called Safaricom Business/Enterprise with a full Chief. It was later reduced to a department, under another division, and the Chief could not picture himself as the HOD reporting to his soon to be former peer. He submitted his resignation letter.

Now from the dailies, the division has been relaunched.

Taking what Bob said at face value, this is simply a reorganisation via a consolidation of departments which inevitably will lead to duplication of duties, automation of some tasks and other such redundancies. Of course this will lead to a number of positions being eliminated.

However, to say that this exercise is intended to reduce costs is way off the mark. If it was intended to cut costs, why incur further costs in having applications and interviews for these positions?

What Bob is doing is just reorganising the company to suit his management style. He may have been in the advisory board when MJ was there but he had no say in the way MJ set up the management. Now in the hot seat, he wants to run the company in his own way. Of course, this will include getting rid of some MJ loyalists who he feels he cannot trust entirely, thus the aptitude tests and fresh applications! It happens whenever there is a change at the top e.g. Seni Adetu at EABL.

@mozenrat: Time costs? Opportunity costs? Plus you can be sure there will be external candidates even though Bob says otherwise. It beats the logic of conducting the interviews in the first place!

@selah: Au contraire! I think it is long overdue. Like I said, if we take what Bob said at face value, then this is simply a reorganisation intended to streamline the company. Although not obvious, it is also intended to align top management to the change in the CEO i.e. Bob wants his own people to head the key functions!

However, as any experienced reorganisation/restructuring professional will tell you, any such exercise inevitably will lead to several redundancies, some of which I listed above. Now I understand that Bob has to appear not to be terminating people only 6 months into his tenure, but some senior people will definately lose their jobs!

Is Safaricom moving from a growth firm to a mature firm?
[I think not yet coz data is where the potential is...]