AUSTRALIAN companies plan to make only modest staff cuts over the next six months, compared with those in Asia and Europe.

Just one of the 88 Australian and New Zealand businesses included in a new global survey of 2100 organisations by consultancy Mercer says it expects to cut more than 10 per cent of its workforce in the next six months.

Most of the hard employment decisions resulting from the global financial crisis have already been taken, the survey reveals, with 8.2 per cent of those 88 businesses confirming they reduced staff levels by more than 10 per cent in the previous six months, The Australian reports.

The figures show Australian companies have not, and do not plan to, cut as deeply into their workforces as those in other parts of the world.

But 57 per cent of businesses say they will shed more employees this year.

Mercer's survey, conducted in May and released yesterday, shows 15.9 per cent of European businesses slashed more than 10 per cent of their workforce between November and April.

And the haemorrhaging is set to continue with 9.5 per cent of organisations expecting to lay off more than 10 per cent of their staff before October.

In the US, 15.3 per cent of businesses had laid off more than 10 per cent of staff in the previous six months and 3.4 per cent planned to do the same over the next six months, while in Asia the figures were 13.9 per cent and 4.2 per cent respectively.

Mercer's chief executive in Australia, Peter Promnitz, said: "Australia and New Zealand have not escaped the global economic turmoil, but we have not been as badly affected as many other developed nations.

"We're seeing lessons learnt from the past about the medium to longer-term risks of cutting too deep."


http://www.news.com.au/perthnow/story/0,,25683142-5017962,00.html