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)那篇题为“Hello there”（你好）的备忘录才发出不久，就已成为彰显在裁员时要避免哪些做法的经典案例。这份1110个英文单词的备忘录，被诸如“appropriate financial envelope”（直译‘适当的财务包络’，实指适当的开支上限——译者注)、“ramp-downs”（直译‘下坡’，实指业务收缩——译者注)和“ecosystems”（生态系统）这样的词搞得晦涩不堪，直到全文快结束时，才漫不经心的提到，公司将裁减成千上万个工作岗位。微软(Microsoft)的这位执行副总裁并未将坏消息坦率地讲出来，而是用一个奇特的虚拟语气句子打掩护：“根据我们的计划，这或将导致裁减约1.25万名……员工。”