It was announced yesterday that People Production and Imaging have been slated to move to the 27th floor from 29 to make room for the People dot com employees on the 35th floor. The move for Production is slated in two weeks (Feb 15) and Imaging is slated for 3 months.

The separation of imaging with a later move has led to some speculation by employees as to possible further cuts since moves have often been accompanied by "reorganizations". For the last three months the consultants have had management keep track of how many images each specialist has retouched in order to gauge "efficiency".

They're laying off the head of our Guild unit: Alex Blanco, who've I'm come to know in recent years as one of the most decent, dedicated, desirable employees--and Guild organizers--we at Time Inc. could possibly have.

How dare they!

No wonder they agreed to extend the contract negotiations until after the layoffs were made--negotiations aimed at destroying much of what is good in our contract.

There are creative, team-building (and company-building!) ways to save and make money, and there are stupid, morale-busting ways to save money. The company has chosen the latter path. Time Inc.'s history of being decent to its employees and fostering an environment conducive to a very hard-working, creative staff has been worsening for years, but this year is a huge leap, down a very dark hole.

--TimeIncRx