The first day back from the festive holidays brings a staff meeting between Maria and her team. Now that she has been in her new job for a couple of months Maria intends to implement her plans for cost savings within the HR department.

She has told the team that her intention is to exceed the Managing Director’s request that all departments make a saving on budget of 6% during 2010. To do this Maria intends to restructure the team slightly and reassign workloads so that specific people handle specific departments.

Maria has also told her team that she intends to review “search company and head-hunter contracts” when sourcing new staff and that she will renegotiate fees and payment terms. This means that “some search companies might be dropped” in favour of ones that Maria has worked with in the past and whom she trusts.