COST CUTTERS: TRIMMING PAYROLL, WITHOUT LAYOFFS

SMART MONEY'S SMALL BIZ
Jul 17, 2008

SMALL-BUSINESS OWNERS LOOKING to stay afloat in today's choppy economy have a lot riding against them. Raw materials are pricier. The U.S. dollar is worth less. Credit is harder to come by. And the cost of health care continues to rise. As a result, many entrepreneurs are slashing one of their biggest expenses: payroll. If there isn't enough work to go around, consider switching up people's duties, suggests RAY FRIEDMAN, a management professor at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn. "I have seen big companies make it through downturns by having factory workers do maintenance work [such as] painting, fixing tools" and the like, he says. Small companies, he adds, can receive similar cost savings by having current employees perform jobs that you would otherwise hire someone to do.