Implications of Retrenchment on Human Resource Personnel and its Functions: A Case of Mines in Masvingo Province
Maunganidze F,? Mupezeni L, Pfebeni G

Abstract
The study focused on the implications on human resource personnel of conducting and driving the retrenchment exercise. The research study was prompted by the economic and social decline which Zimbabwe was subjected to for the past couple of years. This scenario necessitated the need for many organisations, including mines to engage in some retrenchment exercises. Previous studies have largely focused on how the retrenched would be affected before, during and after the retrenchment exercise. It has been a norm for organisations to try to cushion their departing organisational members from possible financial, social and psychological effects of the retrenchment exercise through some workshops such as stress management and entrepreneurship. The retrenched were viewed as the only victims of the retrenchment exercise. This study however took a different approach by considering the effects of the retrenchment exercise on the drivers of the program, the human resource personnel, taking into consideration the fact that some bonds would have been existing among employees, especially having in mind the collective culture of the African societies where social bonds are strong. The study adopted a qualitative approach where interviews and focus group discussions were used in mining companies which retrenched in the past five years in Mavingo province, Zimbabwe. The research was premised on dissonance theory by Festinger as well as the Ubuntu philosophy. It emerged from the study that human resource personnel were affected both physically and psychologically by the retrenchment exercises and they suffered high levels of cognitive dissonance, indicating that they also needed some organisational attention to alleviate these effects in the same manner in which the retrenched are given some form of assistance.

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