You are wrong on this one. There was once a division called Safaricom Business/Enterprise with a full Chief. It was later reduced to a department, under another division, and the Chief could not picture himself as the HOD reporting to his soon to be former peer. He submitted his resignation letter.

Now from the dailies, the division has been relaunched.

Taking what Bob said at face value, this is simply a reorganisation via a consolidation of departments which inevitably will lead to duplication of duties, automation of some tasks and other such redundancies. Of course this will lead to a number of positions being eliminated.

However, to say that this exercise is intended to reduce costs is way off the mark. If it was intended to cut costs, why incur further costs in having applications and interviews for these positions?

What Bob is doing is just reorganising the company to suit his management style. He may have been in the advisory board when MJ was there but he had no say in the way MJ set up the management. Now in the hot seat, he wants to run the company in his own way. Of course, this will include getting rid of some MJ loyalists who he feels he cannot trust entirely, thus the aptitude tests and fresh applications! It happens whenever there is a change at the top e.g. Seni Adetu at EABL.

@mozenrat: Time costs? Opportunity costs? Plus you can be sure there will be external candidates even though Bob says otherwise. It beats the logic of conducting the interviews in the first place!

@selah: Au contraire! I think it is long overdue. Like I said, if we take what Bob said at face value, then this is simply a reorganisation intended to streamline the company. Although not obvious, it is also intended to align top management to the change in the CEO i.e. Bob wants his own people to head the key functions!

However, as any experienced reorganisation/restructuring professional will tell you, any such exercise inevitably will lead to several redundancies, some of which I listed above. Now I understand that Bob has to appear not to be terminating people only 6 months into his tenure, but some senior people will definately lose their jobs!

Is Safaricom moving from a growth firm to a mature firm?
[I think not yet coz data is where the potential is...]