Kaiser lays off 200 employees in Northern California
The exterior of the Kaiser Permanente hospital in Oakland, Calif. on Oct. 23, 2020.
Douglas Zimmerman/SFGATEOne of the largest private employers in California laid off hundreds of staff on Monday.
Kaiser Permanente cut about 200 Northern California positions, citing its ongoing effort “to achieve operational efficiency while providing high-quality care,” the Oakland-headquartered company said Tuesday.
“We have identified opportunities to streamline and redesign work processes, reduce duplication, and standardize our processes in order to better serve our patients and members,” Kaiser said in a statement. “As part of these efforts, we are changing some of our internal operations and how they are staffed.”
The staff reorganization mainly eliminated non-clinical administrative support positions as well as staff in temporary, on call and per diem positions, Kaiser said.
Kaiser has a staff of more than 149,000 employees and 16,000 physicians in California, and the health care provider noted there are nearly 4,000 open staff positions across Northern California.
“While these changes will represent a very small percentage of our workforce, we do not undertake them lightly and we always consider the support our valued colleagues will need as a result of these decisions,” the company said.
Kaiser said that in any staff reorganization it helps employees to identify other positions within Kaiser Permanente to transition them to. “And if we are unable to do so, we provide benefits to eligible employees that typically include education and training benefits, outplacement services, and up to a year of wages and benefits,” the company said.