Gardening provides many of the euphemisms that are used to explain away job cuts – law firm managers talk of pruning departments, weeding out underperformers and cutting out dead wood. Anything, it seems, that doesn’t actually involve real people.
But is this verbal dishonesty a symptom of a deeper cynicism within law firm management about their employees? In a bid to put a positive spin on the recent economic slowdown, some senior lawyers and commentators have described the current economic situation as the perfect opportunity for firms to ‘cut out the dead wood’.
