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Yellow warns of NZ job losses
Mon, 17th Jun 2013
FYI, this story is more than a year old

Yellow have revealed plans to cut around 35 jobs across New Zealand, the biggest change to its business since it de-coupled from Telecom in 2007.

In a statement released to the press, Yellow says it will separate its print and digital teams in a bid to drive its digital marketing offering.

The change in structure will result in the job losses, the majority of which are from the Auckland sales team, with smaller numbers impacted in the regions and in the corporate services team.

CEO Chris Armistead is quick to point out however that although there will be losses in some areas the proposal includes regional job creation in areas like Hamilton and Tauranga.

“It’s always difficult to make staffing changes, and not a decision that we’ve take lightly," he says.

"But we’ve done this to meet the needs of our customers and to help our business evolve.”

Armistead says that at the end of the consultation period, the company will work with any affected staff and, where possible, redeploy them to other areas of the business.

The business units will be served by a corporate services team comprising of HR, marketing, IT and finance, with the proposed changes will be confirmed by 1 July and come into effect on 1 August.

Three-year plan

Armistead says the change is the next stage in the company's three year transformation plan that has been enabled with the completion of a significant IT overhaul.

“We’ve spent the last year focussing on innovation and have just finished building a world-leading proprietary technology platform from which the newly structured company will operate," he says.

"It's the only one of its kind in any directories business around the world and means we can deliver digital tools with real speed and agility, underpinned by our directories offering."

He said having two distinctly different sales teams for directories and digital marketing, will allow Yellow to evolve to meet customers’ needs.

The digital unit will be led by Steve Traplin, former director of Sales, and the directories unit by Liz Austin, former director of Operations.

“Customers talking to us about their digital needs are different," Armistead says.

"We’re becoming an advisor and educator to businesses looking to harness digital channels to showcase what they do.

"These kind of conversations are more in-depth and don’t need to be linked to an annual directories deadline.

“It is part of Yellow's long term commitment to Kiwi business owners that they can be easily found by their customers or potential customers, through either directories or digital marketing.”