News Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin to eliminate 1136 employees

[gdrj]

...I didn’t realize they even had that many.

But I’m told by travel experts (posters here) that the worst is over for Orlando. So that’s good news, right?

The worst is yet to come. As layoffs become terminations, as health insurance ends, as the virus 2nd wave comes at some point. Airline and tourist industry which relied on Federal money to keep things going will continue to struggle. For Orlando, many roadside hotels will shutter, as will restaurants, and the tens of thousands of jobs will or have gone away. But sure the worst is over. ( not directed as poster ).

 

[JoeCamel]

...or demanding more every 90 days until you sell.

Tomato/toMAto

 

[Kamikaze]

The worst is yet to come. As layoffs become terminations, as health insurance ends, as the virus 2nd wave comes at some point. Airline and tourist industry which relied on Federal money to keep things going will continue to struggle. For Orlando, many roadside hotels will shutter, as will restaurants, and the tens of thousands of jobs will or have gone away. But sure the worst is over. ( not directed as poster ).

Yeah, see, thats the thing. We're so good at the coronavirus that we successfully dodged a second wave by just riding the first one directly into the second.

 

[Frank the Tank]

24 year old here. You are right that there’s plenty of things that can be settled with a text or email. There were too many meetings before. But the lack of in person interaction has severely hampered our ability to just go and ask for help, bond with teammates, or gain random information about the business that comes up in conversation. For those of us that are single, the lack of in person interaction has effectively been stripped away entirely, and many social functions won’t return until next year.

There are plenty of us that are absolutely waiting to go back-and plenty of us who will be searching for jobs or trying other things if our current jobs don’t.

It is definitely a tough situation for people that are just starting their careers. That personal interaction when the learning curve is so great in the beginning is critical.

I'll admit as a mid-career professional, though, I couldn't ever imagine going back to the office 100% of the time ever again. I was already about 50/50 remote/commuting prior to the pandemic, which I think is a fairly optimal balance of getting the benefits of regular personal interaction while still being able to work-from-home for the rest of the time. At the end of the day, though, the most valuable resource that we all have is time and, as a parent living in the Chicago area, working from home means that I get back 2 to 3 hours of my day that I would have otherwise been commuting. So, if it's a choice been 100% in-the-office or 100% WFH, I'll take 100% WFH without question (even though I really do prefer the 50/50 split the best ).

I know the media seems to be on a recent kick of trying to put out some contrarian stories about rising negativity about WFH (often including some quotes from those in the commercial real estate industry where workers supposedly "need" to come back to the office), but if you're looking at general employee populations across many industries, the reality is that it is generally *very* popular with employees and it can directly save office costs for employers in an economic environment where cutting expenses is a priority. It's one of the few situations where company cost-cutting actually aligns with employee satisfaction and retention, so it makes sense that a lot of remote working is going to become permanent.

Separately, I'm in the consulting industry like some others here (ex-Big Four and ex-Big Law and now at a smaller consulting firm) and I see a lot of the trends that they have noted: sales people and consultants across the industry that were traveling 100% of the time pre-pandemic are now wondering when they'll ever travel again. My feeling is that the sales people put a huge premium on getting face-to-face interaction and they're going to jump on planes as soon as they're able to do so (which makes sense since personal relationships are critical in that area), but the consultants that actually deliver the services are going to see travel expectations reduced permanently. Clients are seeing that they can get the same project delivered without having to pay 25% extra to cover travel expenses, so they're increasingly going to take that 25% savings. The consultants might still travel to a client site for a small handful of key meetings, but they're probably not going to stay all week every week for months on end like they did in the past. Those consultants are the bread-and-butter of the expense account business travel industry, so that's going to be a significant long-term (and possibly permanent) hit to airlines and hotels in particular (as those are the people that are filling up seats and rooms Monday through Friday).

 

[Lilofan]

The worst is yet to come. As layoffs become terminations, as health insurance ends, as the virus 2nd wave comes at some point. Airline and tourist industry which relied on Federal money to keep things going will continue to struggle. For Orlando, many roadside hotels will shutter, as will restaurants, and the tens of thousands of jobs will or have gone away. But sure the worst is over. ( not directed as poster ).

Better get one's dental work and or other medical procedures done while one is still covered by company health insurance.

 

[TrainsOfDisney]

Better get one's dental work and or other medical procedures done while one is still covered by company health insurance.

Do you think it can’t happen to you?

 

[matt9112]

Business travel as a whole might NEVER come back. Now that everyone is used to Zoom/Skype/Teams etc, there is much less need for people to go face to face.

The reckoning has come....no more can privileged elites vacation on the back of shareholders for "meetings"

Ok im kidding but honestly wanted to say that.

 

[Kamikaze]

The reckoning has come....no more can privileged elites vacation on the back of shareholders for "meetings"

Ok im kidding but honestly wanted to say that.

Yeah, you're wrong though. The 'elites' will still get their vacations. Its the average business traveler that won't have the option.

 

[matt9112]

Yeah, you're wrong though. The 'elites' will still get their vacations. Its the average business traveler that won't have the option.

Oh that's who i meant...if you can take your family to disney world while "working" thats pretty elite to me i did not inherently mean millionaires or anything. Its sad all these jobs went poof but its probably more effective to use zoom etc anyway.

 

[Kamikaze]

Oh that's who i meant...if you can take your family to disney world while "working" thats pretty elite to me i did not inherently mean millionaires or anything. Its sad all these jobs went poof but its probably more effective to use zoom etc anyway.

You're delusional if you think thats 'elite'.

And 'taking your family' isn't business travel. Thats a vacation.

 

[Lilofan]

Yeah, you're wrong though. The 'elites' will still get their vacations. Its the average business traveler that won't have the option.

Some "elite" people in my area laugh about going to WDW on vacation. They either vacation in Europe, Asia or not at all because some enjoy working and growing their net worth in many business ventures.

 

[chriskbrown]

I work for a pretty large organization and they've all but said our business travel will never return to what it was. They have seen we can operate remotely just fine and would rather allocate that money in other areas of the business.

Be interesting to see if business travel even returns 50% - pre-pandemic we were trying more Zoom/remote - post - pandemic I might rarely get on a plane. At least my last business trip let me hit up DL.

 

[chriskbrown]

I also worked Big Four years ago and my current position and industry has required a fair amount of travel. There is a need for face to face business travel but nowhere near the level of where we've been. Much business travel has a "fun" component to it that just doesn't have to happen. When you see some of the invoices and expense reports, you realize how much money the travel industry generates. Much of that doesn't have to happen and now we're seeing that business can go on with much less travel. It might not be as fun (my family has enjoyed their share of "business" travel over the years) but it can be done. I feel very, very sad for job losses (my brother, still working, has spent his entire career at Delta Airlines, so we know anxiety), but its easy to see, IMHO, that the business travel industry might be having a day of reckoning.

I hate business travel - my kids think it is all fun. For me, it was basically hotel, gym, hotel - conference room all day and then dinner - then the email I could not do during the day. Remember going to the Upper Mid-west in Feb. with a wind chill of negative 15 where I never saw the sun most days. I looked at the expense report when I was done and wondered was it really worth it.

BUT I will say that getting to meet people for the first time face to face, in an unstructured manner has paid large benefits. Making a face to face connection has immense value. It will come back, maybe not as much but it will come back. Humans are social beings and the invaluable need to look across from someone is important. I have an employee who works for me who I have not met in almost 3 years - I really want to meet him.