Management restructure to make room for extra 5,000 in-store staff
Morrisons will cut more than 700 head office jobs under plans for a more “simplified management structure,” the supermarket chain has said.
The management shake-up comes as Morrisons begins recruiting 5,000 shop floor staff to its supermarkets across the country, to improve employee presence in store.
Chief executive David Potts, who spent 38 years at Tesco before replacing Dalton Philips as Morrisons’ lead in January 2015, said the number of people employed at its head office had increased by 50 per cent since 2008.
"We are focusing on the things that matter to our customers. That means having more of our staff in our stores, improving product availability and helping customers at our checkouts. We believe our customers and our staff will appreciate the improvements,” Potts said.
"To support this, we need a simpler, faster and cost-conscious head office and that requires some tough but necessary decisions,” he added.
In recent years, Britain’s fourth largest supermarket chain has struggled to compete with discount rivals Aldi and Lidl and has been slow to embrace the fast-growing areas of convenience stores and online.
Last Christmas, Morrisons revealed the worst sales of any of the major supermarkets over the critical trading period, for the second year running.
On his appointment, chairman Andy Higginson, who joined Potts from Tesco, said: “David is the best retailer I have worked with in 25 years in the industry. He will bring to Morrisons a focus on the customer, a track record of delivery, flair, talent, and immense energy.”
Potts’ first move to simplify the management structure at the struggling supermarket came in March, when half of its 10-person strong executive team were cut. This included the customer marketing and digital director, retail director, logistics director, convenience managing director and property and strategy director.
“I will now be constructing a leaner management board, with the aim of simplifying and speeding up the business,” he said.
Morrisons said it had begun a consultation period at its head office, which is expected to last 45 days, whereby the affected 720 staff would be offered voluntary redundancy.