I've seen too many bosses cut their companies down to just the skeleton and still think they're managing well.

A game with a salt shaker and a cup can explain this clearly.
Pour a bunch of salt on the table, tilt the highball glass and place it on top.
Gently blow away the excess salt with a straw.
In the end, only five or six grains of salt remain, yet the cup still stands.
It looks pretty amazing, right?
But what is this thing afraid of? The wind.
Layoffs are exactly like this game.
Usually, during an eight-hour workday, employees chat, browse the internet, drink coffee, and go to the bathroom.
Occasionally, someone takes leave, and the company still runs smoothly.
The boss thinks, aren’t these all redundancies? Blow them away.
Legal can be cut, marketing can have sales do part-time work, administrative and cleaning staff can be省.
The calculations are ringing loudly.
The problem lies in the three words "no wind."
What if something really happens?
Core employees suddenly get sick, competitors make moves, business volume skyrockets.
The remaining 20% of people can't handle it.
Hiring temporary staff?
New hires are less than one-third as efficient as experienced employees in the first three months.
By the time you train them, the company is already in trouble.
There’s a term in engineering called "effective redundancy design."
A bridge rated for 20 tons is actually built to withstand 30 to 50 tons.
It's not that the designer is crazy; it's to prepare for the day a超重车 comes along.
A company's human redundancy is like this bridge’s冗余.
If senior management jumps ship and takes half the department, the company won't collapse overnight.
Someone takes maternity leave, someone gets sick, and business can still转.
In economics, this is called the "two-oxen pulling a cart" model.
A cart pulled by two donkeys, and you find that one donkey can barely pull it.
Don’t get cocky, don’t sell the other one.
Otherwise, the remaining donkey will quickly overwork itself to death or just run away.
Then you’ll have nothing usable left.
I've seen the stupidest bosses cut the company down so that everyone is running at full capacity.
And then?
One person takes leave, and the entire project stalls.
One person quits, and it takes half a month to find a replacement, and clients leave directly.
Is saving that little salary enough to pay the penalty?
Remember a standard.
If your team has no one "seems to be loafing," and everyone is忙到没时间喝水 every day,
It’s not good management; it’s that the risk is already at the door.
A healthy company always has some human余量.
It’s not about养闲人; it’s about buying insurance.
Workers, remember one thing too.
When the boss starts吹"盐粒," it’s time for you to prepare to run.
Because he no longer believes that "wind" will come.
Or he simply doesn’t care what happens to the people on the bridge after it collapses.
Redundancy is not waste; it’s survival space.
Whether it’s a company or you personally, leaving some余量 is the only way to withstand surprises.
When there’s no wind, everyone thinks they are a god.
When the wind comes, you’ll see who’s裸泳.