Re: Virtually every company that has meaningful revenue growth also has meaningful headcount growth. It doesn't HAVE TO BE true, but it usually is - there's not much reason to debate that.
Indeed, there's no point gainsaying my claim that most of the corporate growth stems from M&As, not hiring... And the best way to check it is to compare the workforce trends for public utilities/companies that, for political/legal reasons, have been unable to merge/acquire with that of private conglomerates. Take, for instance, the railways: up to now, European railways (ie SNCF, SNCB, DB,...) count among the largest employers. France's SNCF currently employs about 170,000 workers. Belgium's SNCB employs 41,000 people:
eiro.eurofound.eu.int
Now, like most state-owned utilities (post offices, even telecoms [Belgium's Belgacom is still 51%-owned by the state]), European railways have not merged yet. Their revenues, however, have skyrocketted(*) while their workforce was slashed dramatically over the past 30 years. In the 1970s, Belgium's SNCB employed over 70,000 workers --30,000 more than today. The same is true for telephone companies, post offices, etc.
Contrariwise, the banking sector has witnessed the arrival of ever more bigger banks and financial giants but only as a result of relentless, successive M&As:
The recent flurry of merger activity in the sector, however, has added new complexity to industrial relations in banking. This process has created new banking groups operating in Belgium such as BBL-ING, KBC/CBC, AXA and, most recently, Fortis.
This last group, the result of the merger of Générale de Banque/Generale Bank (with 9,000 employees) and CGER/ASLK (14,000 employees), is now the third largest employer in the private sector, behind Belgacom and the GIB group. Unlike the other mergers, the one that gave birth to Fortis involved a private concern (Générale de Banque/Generale Bank) and a semi-public operator (CGER/ASLK).
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eiro.eurofound.eu.int
So much so that, today, Fortis Bank is one of Belgium's top employer ( fortis.com ). Now, this is not to debunk your viewpoint altogether. Some businesses such as retailing and franchising see their growth based entirely on expending their workforce through opening up additional stores, fast-food outlets, etc....
(*) Bénéfice record pour la SNCF
Aude Sérès
15 mars 2006, (Rubrique Entreprises)
TRANSPORTS L'entreprise publique affiche un résultat courant de 417 millions d'euros pour 2005. Les syndicats demandent des contreparties salariales.
DU JAMAIS VU ! Le résultat net 2006 de la SNCF, qui sera approuvé ce matin par son conseil d'administration, a plus que triplé à 1,27 milliard d'euros. Cette performance tient beaucoup à la plus-value de 805 millions d'euros encaissée après la cession des parts de la SNCF dans la Société hydroélectrique du Midi (Shem) et dans Cegetel. Le résultat courant s'est établi à 417 millions d'euros contre 153 millions d'euros en 2004. Cette année, l'entreprise table sur un résultat courant de 330 millions d'euros.
La progression enregistrée en 2005 s'explique à la fois par la progression du trafic (+ 2,3% pour les grandes lignes et 6,5% pour le TER) et par la réduction des charges. Les charges de personnel, en particulier, se sont allégées. L'an dernier, les effectifs ont diminué de 3 590 postes et 2 749 suppressions de postes sont prévues cette année. Quant au principal foyer de pertes, le fret, son déficit a été presque réduit de moitié, de 405 millions d'euros à environ 220 millions.
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