The aftermath of retrenchment

Awarded for his work is University of South Australia’s lecturer in Regional and Urban Planning, Dr Johannes Pieters, who explored the process of adjustment to retrenchment and considers that while large scale factory closures are commonly cast in the media as a community and personal disaster, the reality reveals a range of outcomes that are not always negative.

“In many ways, for the generations of men who have worked in heavy industry settings such as the automotive industry, what they face when they are retrenched is coming to terms with a perceived broken promise – the collapse of the idea of a job for life,” Dr Pieters says.

“The networks that relate to that notion connect across a person’s life – where they live and how they feel about home and the relationships that support their lives are important factors in how well they cope.”

Dr Pieters says central to a successful transition is a good retrenchment package, tailored to the specific labour market situation facing workers in a region.

“Losing a job you have held for a long time in an industry you believed to be a permanent fixture requires huge readjustment and unstressed time to plan and prepare for the next move, retraining, job searching, semi-retirement – so a good exit package gives people space to think about the next step.

“The research I undertook over three years with people who took voluntary redundancy or were retrenched from the car industry in Adelaide in 2004 showed that adjustment occurs at multiple levels – in terms of personal identity and reinvention of the working self in a new context, adjustment to the loss of the psychological and financial benefits of work and adjustments to a new balance between work and home.

“The experience of the end of employment in one job can be devastating, however this does not rule out the opening up of new and positive opportunities and new relationships with home and work and sometimes, if not often, workers feel that their overall circumstances have improved over time.”

Dr Pieters says for many workers the relief of not being engaged in heavy and taxing physical work frees them up to spend more productive time with children and families, but for others new work can only be found a long way from home so there are new stresses in a longer commute.

“What the research showed is that the impact of retrenchments or large scale industry shut downs cannot be viewed through a single or narrow lens,” he says.

“The impacts are multi-dimensional, they can be positive and negative, and they are deeply entrenched in the suburban home and work experience.

“But vital to positive outcomes is a starting point that allows workers the financial security and breathing space to make those adjustments.”