Celebrating our company’s Thanksgiving potluck last week and sharing our reasons to be thankful with a bunch of friends I work with, kept me thinking and reflecting throughout the weekend about my eight-year journey with Avocados From Mexico. I felt compelled to share my reflections on this platform.
I’ve been both shocked and touched by the latest stats. There were 17 million layoffs in 2021 in the US, and according to TrueUp’s tech layoff tracker, there were 1,138 rounds of layoffs at tech companies globally through mid-November this year, affecting 182,605 people. Hopefully, most of them have already landed on their feet, but even right before Thanksgiving, we saw massive layoffs across the U.S. which means that thousands of people sat at the Thanksgiving table yesterday worried about an uncertain future as they lost their jobs this month.
As I sat around my company’s Thanksgiving celebration last week and couldn’t help by reflecting on the eight years that I have been part of the Avocados From Mexico’s organization. That thought stayed with me for a few hours after. During those 8 years, I have witnessed many ups and downs as any business has. The downs included a multi-year pandemic and the logistics challenges that it brought with it and the threat of a recession among many others. Because of those events, I have seen budget cuts and budget reductions affecting many of our marketing programs. Even after we have put so much effort, time, and passion into ideating and organizing those programs…
What I have NOT seen:
- What I have never seen are layoffs because of external economic factors. The reason is that no matter how hard those can be, we have always been extremely well prepared.
- I have not seen either, anyone let go because of poorly planned overstaffing, because every hire we make is very strategically and carefully planned and based on a well-thought-out long-term plan.
- I have never seen anyone lose their job because of a company restructuring because when we structured it in the first place, it was done consciously, carefully, and based on a solid long-term plan. That’s why when we restructure, we only restructure for growth, not for excessive optimism.
During the Thanksgiving weekend, I extend deep gratitude to all who allow that to happen. In the first place Dolora Sillman, APEAM finance director for her brilliant financial skills that keep us always in good shape regardless of external factors. To our CFO Miguel Molina, and his core team Dunia Salguero and Quintin Rohrbaugh for an extremely responsible, hyper-conscious, and conservative management of our financial resources. And especially to our CEO Alvaro Luque for always making unwavering sound, well-thought-out strategic decisions when hiring, promoting, and restructuring, and over everything else, for putting people first.
Special thanks to the growers and packers who make our business possible and their respective organizations APEAM and MHAIA.
We will still face unforeseen, inevitable challenges as we continue through our journey, but we will go through them feeling safe and with the certainty of going together because we know that we have a leadership that has put people above all.
Ivonne Kinser
President of AFM’s Culture Committee | VP of Marketing and Innovation
#culture #culturematters #thanksgiving
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