Hospitality company, OYO, is planning to cut down its workforce in India by 500. Employees in the partner-facing experience and business development teams will be rendered jobless. In all, about five per cent of the Indian workforce, which is about 12,000 strong, will reportedly be impacted.
The move is part of OYO’s measures to cut costs and make the operations more efficient, across departments. Employees being laid off will be offered two months’ salary as severance pay. Other departments may also be trimmed in the future.
In Hyderabad, Mumbai and NCR, some of the teams, including the partner-facing experience team are being dissolved altogether. The members of these teams are being reassigned to the business development team.
OYO is reportedly taking performance tracking very seriously. Based on the performance of the employees, some may be required to undergo a performance improvement programme, and may even be replaced if the results are not up to the mark. The underperformers will either be shifted to the business development team or be asked to leave.
However, some former employees are certain that these are simply strategies being followed by OYO to reduce its workforce, as the Company was not so rigid and strict about employees meeting their targets earlier.
In early December, the Company had appointed Rohit Kapoor as the new CEO of India Southeast Asia. Kapoor had stepped into the shoes of Aditya Ghosh who was promoted to the position of board member.
SoftBank, that backs OYO, recently experienced huge losses owing to investments in Uber and WeWork. It is, therefore, asking its investee firms to focus on sustainability and corporate governance.
