When Redundancies Go Wrong: The Hidden Costs of Amateur Hour in European Transformations

By Lydik Grynfeltt, Director, HR Bridge Consulting

This weekend, as I watched the autumn leaves fall in London whilst contemplating the rather dramatic political theatre unfolding across Europe, I couldn’t help but reflect on the curious parallels between natural cycles and business transformations. The EU continues its complex dance with member states over everything from trade policies to migration, whilst France grapples with its own internal reforms, the Netherlands navigates coalition politics, and the UK… well, the UK continues to redefine its relationship with everyone. Add to this cocktail the persistent shadows of conflict in Ukraine and Gaza, the relentless march of artificial intelligence disrupting traditional business models, and you have a recipe for what economists politely call “challenging market conditions.”

Yet, as I sipped my morning coffee and read reports of cautious optimism about potential resolutions to both conflicts, I was reminded of a fundamental truth that has guided my twenty-plus years in HR transformation: chaos creates opportunity for those wise enough to prepare, and disaster awaits those who wing it. This principle applies nowhere more dramatically than in the treacherous waters of international redundancy programmes.

The €475,000 Surveillance Scandal and Other Expensive Mistakes

Consider IKEA France’s rather spectacular misadventure between 2002 and 2013, where the furniture giant found itself paying €475,000 to private investigators to spy on employees during various employment disputes. What began as poorly managed redundancy procedures escalated into a full-blown legal nightmare involving dismissed workers, strike actions, and court proceedings in Versailles. The Swedish efficiency that works so well for flat-pack furniture apparently doesn’t translate seamlessly to French employment law.

Or take Auchan’s more recent catastrophe in September 2025, where their plan to cut 2,400 jobs was completely blocked by the Lille Administrative Court. The issue? They treated five separate business segments as one entity during consultation procedures. It’s rather like trying to serve a five-course meal as a single dish – technically possible, perhaps, but unlikely to satisfy anyone and guaranteed to create a mess.

These aren’t isolated incidents of bad luck; they’re predictable outcomes of a fundamental misunderstanding about what international redundancy programmes actually entail.

The French Exception: Where Every Rule Has Three Sub-clauses

France, bless its bureaucratic soul, has elevated redundancy procedures to an art form that would make Versailles courtiers proud. The PSE (Plan de Sauvegarde de l’Emploi) isn’t merely a document; it’s a carefully choreographed performance requiring external experts, works council consultations, DREETS approval, and enough paperwork to deforest a small woodland.

Under Articles L. 1233-34 and L. 1233-35 of the French Labour Code, works councils have the absolute right to call upon external experts at the employer’s expense for any collective redundancy involving ten or more employees. These experts don’t come cheap – we’re talking tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of euros, depending on complexity. Companies have precisely ten days to challenge these expert appointments, creating the kind of time pressure that would make a Formula One pit crew nervous.

The recent Valeo restructuring illustrates this beautifully. In November 2024, the automotive supplier announced 1,000 job cuts and two plant closures. Poor communication strategy, inadequate consultation with works councils, and insufficient external redeployment support led to a 17 percent stock price drop, union strikes, and government intervention threats. Eventually, they were forced back to the negotiating table with enhanced social measures – a costly lesson in the importance of getting it right the first time.

Cross-Border Complications: A Symphony in Different Keys

International redundancy programmes aren’t simply French procedures multiplied by the number of countries involved. They’re complex orchestrations requiring simultaneous coordination across jurisdictions with different legal frameworks, consultation periods, and cultural expectations.

Take the Eversparks Electrics case study, involving operations across the UK, Ireland, France, and Germany. Project managers had to synchronise communications whilst managing different Works Council requirements and European Works Council oversight. Information flow becomes critical – reveal too much too early in one country, and you risk disrupting the entire timeline. Reveal too little too late, and you’re in breach of consultation requirements.

European Works Councils add another delicious layer of complexity. They have overriding powers that can supersede national Works Councils, creating coordination challenges that would test even the most experienced project managers. It’s rather like conducting an orchestra where half the musicians are reading different sheets of music.

The Spotify Shuffle: When Tech Giants Get Dutch Law Wrong

Even technology companies, supposedly masters of complex systems, stumble spectacularly. In late 2024, Spotify’s Netherlands operation underwent a “global reorganisation” affecting 19 out of 172 employees. Management assumed this wasn’t “significant” enough to require Works Council consultation under Dutch law. The Dutch Enterprise Court disagreed rather emphatically, forcing Spotify to completely reverse their reorganisation measures. The financial and reputational costs of this miscalculation far exceeded what proper consultation would have cost initially.

Similarly, Insight Nederland learned an expensive lesson when they eliminated a Senior Solution Manager position overseeing ten sales department managers without consulting their works council. Again, the Dutch Enterprise Court ruled against them, requiring complete reversal of the organisational change.

The Expert Ecosystem: More Than Just Lawyers

This complexity has created a sophisticated ecosystem of specialised service providers that extends far beyond legal counsel. External experts provide independent analysis of economic rationale and assess proposed social measures. Reclassification firms coordinate comprehensive redeployment programmes through dedicated project teams. Government relations specialists navigate regulatory approval processes with DREETS and other authorities.

The Ministry of Labour’s increasing reluctance to approve RCC (Rupture Conventionnelle Collective) agreements without substantial external redeployment measures demonstrates how the bar continues to rise for acceptable redundancy programmes.

Project Management: The Unsung Hero of Successful Transformations

What separates successful international redundancy programmes from expensive disasters isn’t superior legal advice – it’s superior project management. The coordination challenges are immense: timeline synchronisation across jurisdictions, stakeholder management involving multiple Works Councils and trade unions, information flow control, risk mitigation, and cultural navigation.

Experienced project managers understand that a Senior Solution Manager’s dismissal in the Netherlands might seem insignificant until it triggers a Works Council intervention. They know that treating five business segments as one entity in France is like serving wine in coffee cups – technically possible but culturally offensive and legally problematic.

The Private Equity Imperative

For private equity firms, investment funds, and family offices, these complexities represent both significant risk and competitive advantage. Portfolio companies undergoing transformation face the same challenges as established multinationals, but often with less internal expertise and greater time pressure.

The failure rate statistics are sobering. Even large corporations with substantial resources struggle with European redundancy procedures. Michelin, despite €3.6 billion in operating profit, required twelve weeks of complex negotiations to reach agreement with four trade unions for their plant closures. Nokia’s 2017 attempt to cut 600 French jobs faced such significant union opposition and legal challenges that it violated their previous commitment not to reduce French workforce for two years post-Alcatel acquisition.

Solutions in Uncertain Times

As we navigate this period of European political uncertainty, AI disruption, and global conflict, the temptation might be to delay difficult decisions or hope that external circumstances improve. History suggests this is precisely the wrong approach. Economic uncertainty makes effective redundancy programmes more necessary, not less, whilst regulatory complexity makes amateur execution more dangerous, not less.

The solution isn’t to avoid international redundancy programmes – it’s to execute them with the sophisticated expertise they demand. This means engaging specialists who understand not just employment law, but project management, stakeholder coordination, government relations, and cultural navigation across multiple jurisdictions.

Companies that recognise the complexity early and invest in appropriate expertise navigate these challenges successfully. Those that treat international redundancy programmes as scaled-up domestic procedures discover expensive lessons about European employment law, usually whilst explaining to shareholders why their transformation programme is six months behind schedule and significantly over budget.

The autumn leaves will continue falling, political theatre will continue unfolding, and business transformations will continue requiring careful orchestration. The question isn’t whether challenges will arise – it’s whether you’ll be prepared when they do.

At HR Bridge Consulting, we specialise in navigating the complex intersection of international employment law, project management, and stakeholder coordination for private equity firms, investment funds, and family offices. Because in transformation, as in life, preparation beats improvisation every single time.