Memo to Sales Personnel

A dear reader pointed out that a hilarious post has appeared on Pfizer's Cafe Pharma message board. And just to show you that the sales reps, who are being downsized, do have some humor, here it is:

Subject: SALES FORCE - DOWNSIZING

As a result of the reduction of money budgeted for department areas, we are forced to cut down on our number of personnel. One of the first areas to be affected will be our field sales force. We are proposing initiating the reduction in sales force through voluntary means.

Under this plan, older employees will be asked to take early retirement, thus permitting the retention of lower salaried,younger personnel who represent our future.

Therefore, a program to phase out older personnel by the end of the current fiscal year, via retirement, will be placed into effect.

This program will be known as SLAP (Sever Late-Aged Personnel).

Employees who are SLAPPED will be given the opportunity to look for jobs outside the company.

SLAPPED employees can request a review of their employment records before actual retirement takes place This review phase of the program is called SCREW (Survey of Capabilities of Retired Early Workers).

All employees who have been SLAPPED and SCREWED may file an appeal with upper management.

This appeal is called SHAFT (Study by Higher Authority Following Termination).

Under the terms of the new policy, an employee may be SLAPPED once, SCREWED twice, but may be SHAFTED as many times as the company deems appropriate.

If an employee follows the above procedure, he/she will be entitled to get: HERPES (Half Earnings for Retired Personnel's Early Severance) or CLAP (Combined Lump sum Assistance Payment).

As HERPES and CLAP are considered benefit plans, once an employee has received HERPES or CLAP they will no longer be eligible to be SCREWED by the company.

The next phase of our voluntary reduction program will be aimed at the younger employees. The company will initiate a policy of intense training and frequent testing. We will moniter the results of this Special High Intensity Training (SHIT). The field personnel who do not perform well when receiving SHIT will be given more SHIT.

We take pride in the amount of SHIT management can dish out. J&J CAN give employees more SHIT than any company in the industry. Our managers are specially trained to make sure representatives receive all the SHIT they can stand. We envision a fair number of field personnel will not be able to handle all the SHIT and will eventually resign.

These programs should drastically reduce the field personnel through voluntary means. Ultimately they will reduce costs and contribute to the overall profitability of Johnson & Johnson.