Surviving redundancy: the perceptions of UK managers

Redundancy, delayering and other forms of organizational change have become increasingly prevalent over the last ten years. This paper is based on a five year UMIST‐Institute of Management research programme which has been used to explore the impact of redundancy on UK managers’ sense of loyalty, motivation, morale and loyalty to the organization. The paper reveals that redundancy is a particularly damaging form of organizational change even on the survivors of redundancy. The research reveals that where redundancy has been used as a means of change surviving managers’ perceptions of their organizations are significantly more adversely affected than where change is enacted without the use of delayering or redundancy. The research raises significant questions about how change is managed in organizations.