Norway’s biggest company, Statoil, started off the New Year with some good news for employees: Management has decided it’s “reached its goal” for staff reductions, and will likely stop cutting more jobs.
The cost- and job-cutting began in 2012, even before oil prices collapsed in 2014. Today Statoil has around 5,000 fewer employees than it did five years ago.
Newspaper Stavanger Aftenblad reported that the goal of paring down to between 20,700 and 21,100 employees had been reached, with 21,105 on the payroll at the end of November including consultants. Numbers weren’t yet available for staffing as of the end of December, but they’re believed to be even lower. The company had also received notice of additional resignations at the beginning of this year.
That means the constant fear of layoffs will subside, at least for now. Statoil spokesman Ola Ander Skauby said, however, that the company would “continually work on improving and making operations more efficient, to maintain strong competitiveness.” He noted that Statoil could never rule out more personnel changes, “but there aren’t any new estimates or goals for staffing” at present.
newsinenglish.no staff
