Signs of progress on how employers view employees

I know I'm going to regret this.

Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc., a well-known outplacement consultancy, recently distributed a press release reporting the results of a survey of HR executives they conducted.

The results were interesting enough that I'm making an exception to my policy of ignoring any and all press releases that come my way.

First, a complaint: As is the custom with companies publishing surveys, Challenger neglects to mention the sample size -- a defect that by itself would usually lead to me to assume a sample size of 12 and to my tossing the results in the trash.

Since the press release reported that one response was given by 52.4 percent of respondents, though, simple math tells me at least 262 individuals responded to the survey. That's enough to be worthy of attention. Here's the good news: While companies certainly have laid off huge numbers of employees since the economy first started to implode, it appears many of them are doing everything they can to minimize the number. From the press release:

... employers announcing job cuts have initiated more cost-cutting measures than employers that have not cut payrolls. Companies that made permanent job cuts averaged an additional six cost-cutting measures. Meanwhile, companies that have avoided layoffs averaged less than three cost-cutting measures.

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