Preserving the Dignity of the "Downsized"

This Labor Day has me feeling grateful for a job, looking guilty about complaining about long hours, and wishing for employment for so many struggling in this jobless economy.   There may be little each of us can do, personally, to spare our loved ones, friends, or co-workers from the pain of unemployment. But there is one small step we might take to help preserve the dignity of the "downsized:" showing compassion through the words we use.  

Let's remember that the unemployment rate is made up of real people -- people paying for rent or mortgages or kids’ braces -- and let's try to resist referring to workers and departments as being  “updgraded,”  “aligned,” “consolidated,” “restructured,” “reorganized,” “streamlined,” "downsized" or "right-sized." The news about workforce job eliminations often make employees sound more like broken down Buicks that need to be hauled off to the junkyard rather than people. Husbands,  wives, sons and daughters are not commodities, not simply  “human resources” or “human capital” as the news about their departures might indicate.    

I’m not suggesting that more human terms can save jobs or take the sting away from losing a job. But as humans, we owe each other better words, language that helps those separated from the workplace believe they meant something to the places where they worked and the people who counted on them.