Barely 10 days old, Stephen Elop’s “Hello there” memo has already become a classic example of how not to fire people. It is a 1,110-word document stiff with “appropriate financial envelopes”, “ramp-downs” and “ecosystems” which, towards the end, casually mentions that thousands of Microsoft jobs are to go. Rather than dish out the bad news directly, the executive vice-president takes refuge behind a curious subjunctive: “We plan that this would result in an estimated reduction of 12,500 . . . employees.”
斯蒂芬•埃洛普(Stephen Elop)那篇題爲「Hello there」（你好）的備忘錄才發出不久，就已成爲彰顯在裁員時要避免哪些做法的經典案例。這份1110個英文單詞的備忘錄，被諸如「appropriate financial envelope」（直譯『適當的財務包絡』，實指適當的開支上限——譯者注)、「ramp-downs」（直譯『下坡』，實指業務收縮——譯者注)和「ecosystems」（生態系統）這樣的詞搞得晦澀不堪，直到全文快結束時，才漫不經心的提到，公司將裁減成千上萬個工作崗位。微軟(Microsoft)的這位執行副總裁併未將壞訊息坦率地講出來，而是用一個奇特的虛擬語氣句子打掩護：「根據我們的計劃，這或將導致裁減約1.25萬名……員工。」