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Every time this happens at Amazon, I picture Gary Oldman's Zorg character in The 5th Element.

Lackey: "Excuse me, sir. The council is worried about the economy heating up. They wondered if it'd be possible to fire 500000. Maybe from one of the smaller companies where no one would notice..."

Zorg: "Fire one million."

Lackey: "But 500000... One million. Fine, sir. Sorry to have disturbed you."

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At the time I remember that shocking me. Now, years later I think it's probably the right approach. Cut deeply ONCE and be done with it, these multiple rounds of cuts are totally demoralising and destroy goodwill, causing good people who weren't redundant to start looking for a new gig.

To be fair, these cuts are hard to anticipate. Hindsight is 20/20.

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