#34. Should businesses hire employees for their entire lives?
The decision to hire an employee for life is a serious commitment on the part of both parties. For the employee, such an arrangement means lifetime job security. From the perspective of an employer, however, the deal is not so sweet. Guaranteed lifetime employment, or tenure, at a company, can promote bad work habits, prevent innovation, and lead to potentially disastrous personnel problems.
When a workers' employment is contingent upon their job performance, they will tend to work diligently. On the other hand, if workers know that no matter how hard they work, they will receive the same amount of money and have no chance of being fired, there are no incentives for them to work. For people to be model workers they need compelling reasons to work hard and produce work of the highest quality. A tenure-system promotes laziness, inefficiency and lowquality work because it fails to offer incentives for good work, and fails to offer compelling deterrents against bad work.
Secondly, companies that offer lifetime positions to employees cannot adapt to a rapidly changing world. For instance, if an employee who was hired by a company twenty years ago might be too old to effectively learn new computer
related skills. In today’s modern office environment, companies that cannot make effective use of new technology are at a severe disadvantage to those that can. In this case, a company that does not have the freedom to restructure, hiring and firing employees, in accordance with shifting demands is likely to fail. A company that provides its employees with tenure effectively locks out new blood and runs the risk of being paralyzed by a staff unable to change with the times.
Finally, offering tenure to employees is a major risk because of unforeseeable personnel problems. Every office, no matter how well managed, is bound to have personality conflicts. In many cases, personality conflicts can lead to one of the feuding parties leaving the company. But if the conflict involves two tenured employees, the business might be seriously affected, even destroyed. Despite the uncertainty it brings to workers lives, the company must look out for its own best interests first and not allow this disastrous situation to occur by not instituting a tenure policy.
34. 公司应该终生雇用职员吗？
终生雇用一名雇员的决定对双方来说都是一项严肃的承诺。对于雇员来说，这样的安排意味着终生的工作保障。然而从雇主的角度来看，这笔买卖就不那么美好了。在一家公司里保证终生雇用或任职会助长坏的工作习惯、阻碍革新并导致人事方面潜在的灾难性问题。
当对一位工人的雇用是暂时的并取决于他们的工作表现时，他们倾向于努力工作。相反，如果工人知道无论他们工作得多努力，他们都会得到相同数量的钱且不会遭解雇时，他们就不会有工作的积极性。要是想成为模范工人，他们就需要有强迫性的理由去努力工作并最高质量地完成工作。终身制系统助长懒惰、低效和低质量工作，这是因为它没有提供做好工作的动力，也没有提供对工作不力的强制性震慑。
第二，那些向员工提供终身职位的公司无法适应飞速变化的世界。比方说，如果一位员工20年前就受雇于一家公司，那他就可能太老了以至于无法高效地学习与计算机相关的技能。在今天的现代办公环境下，无法有效运用新科技的公司与那些能利用的公司相比处于严重劣势。在这种情况下，一家无法自由重组并根据不断变化的需求雇用或解雇员工的公司将会失败。向员工提供终身职位的公司实际上将会阻止新血液的进入，并有因员工无法与时俱进而陷于瘫痪的危险。
最后，向员工提供终身职位是一项很大的冒险，因为这会出现无法预知的人事问题。每一个办公室，无论管理得多好，都会有人员方面的冲突。在很多情况下，人员之间的冲突可能导致敌对的一方离开公司。但是如果冲突涉及两位拥有终身职位的雇员，那么业务可能就会受到严重影响，甚至遭到破坏。尽管会给工人的生活带来不确定的因素，公司还是应该把追求自己的最大利益放在首位，通过不设立终身职位政策来阻止以上提及的灾难性情况的发生。
- commitment ［kəˈmitmənt］n. 委托事项，承担义务
- compelling ［kəmˈpeliŋ］ adj. 强制的，强迫的
- perspective ［pəˈspektiv］n. 远景，前途，观点，看法
- laziness ［ˈleizinis］ n. 怠惰, 无精打采
- tenure ［ˈtenjə］ n. 终身任职权
- promote ［prəˈməut］ vt. 促进
- deterrent ［diˈterənt］ n. 威慑
- contingent ［kənˈtindʒənt］adj. 暂时的
- adapt to 适应
- paralyze ［ˈpærəˌlaiz］ vt. 使瘫痪，使麻痹
- diligently ［ˈdilədʒəntli］adv. 勤勉地，坚持不懈地
- disastrous ［diˈzæstrəs］ adj. 损失惨重的