Seeing Staff as Assets, Even When Times Are Tough

Some organisations see their staff as a cost. Others see them as an asset. That different vantage point makes all the difference.

Yesterday I joined a brilliant lunchtime webinar run by Marie Thake on how to get senior leaders to buy into training initiatives. Plenty of insightful observations, but it was Marie’s opening line that stayed with me:

Some organisations see their staff as a cost. Some see them as an asset.

Simple, almost obvious, yet more relevant now than ever.

It reminded me of a post I saw last week from an experienced L&D lead in the NHS. After decades of service, she wrote that the government sees her “as an administrative cost that can be simply got rid of”. This was in response to the plan to reduce non-clinical roles to protect and increase clinical capacity - and the way the decision was communicated left many feeling that non-clinical roles were being framed as wasteful or obsolete.

Whatever your politics, governments make tough choices because resources are finite. NHS decisions are especially difficult because they affect services millions rely on.

But how those decisions are communicated matters because communication reveals mindset. Language is not a superficial layer, it’s usually the clearest indicator of whether an organisation genuinely sees its people as assets or as costs. Public sector teams understand when investment isn’t possible; what they react to is when the explanation implies that their contribution carries little value.

A more constructive framing would have been:
“Resources are limited. We’ve chosen to prioritise clinical roles over non-clinical roles at this time, and here is the logic behind that decision. We know this has consequences, but we believe the benefits outweigh them.”

Still a difficult message, but one that recognises staff as contributors, not expendable overhead. It signals that while prioritisation is necessary, the value of those affected is not in question.

When people feel reduced to numbers they stop going above and beyond, disengage from the organisation’s purpose, and lose confidence in leadership. All of this affects productivity, creating a vicious circle where cuts introduced to address low productivity end up making it worse.

Even when you can’t invest in your staff financially right now, you can still communicate and act in ways that show you see your people as an asset. It’s in the reasoning you share, the honesty with which you handle uncertainty, and the way you treat those who leave - and those who stay.

How you speak about people reflects how you see them, and how you see them shapes the culture you lead, which determines whether your organisation can deliver on its ambitions.