Last month, Shaw Communications offered a buyout program to 6,500 of its employees, and this morning announced an update to its “voluntary departure program” (VPD), the first part of their multi-year Total Business Transformation (TBT) plan, which aims to “reinvent its operating model to better meet the changing tastes and expectations of consumers and businesses.”
Roughly 3,300 employees opted for the buyout, which represents 25% of Shaw’s total workforce. The company said the majority of employees who accepted the departure package were in areas of Shaw’s business “that can be further optimized through the use of technology and a more efficient service delivery model.”
The program was designed to ensure no customer-facing staff, such as customer care, retail or sales employees, for example, were eligible for the program.
“We made the difficult but necessary decision to modernize our wireline and satellite businesses by offering a generous package to those people who helped us build Shaw and chose not to join us in this transformative period of growth,” said Jay Mehr, President, Shaw Communications, in a statement issued to iPhone in Canada. “We thank all our employees for the contributions they have made to this organization and we thank each of them for their dedication to our customers.”
Shaw says a restructuring charge of nearly $450 million will be incurred in fiscal Q2 of 2018, related to severance, other employee related costs and other expenses linked to the TBT program.
The company also announced today its current Chief Financial Officer, Vito Culmone will be leaving as of May 4, 2018, and Trevor English will be take the role of Executive Vice President, Chief Financial & Corporate Development Officer. The shuffle is part of the TBT plan and consolidates executive positions to English, who will report to CEO Brad Shaw.
