Mercer affected as parent axes 750 jobs

GLOBAL - Mercer Human Resource Consulting will bear some of the brunt of parent company Marsh & McLennan Companies decision to cut 750 jobs.

Pension consulting arm Mercer and insurance division Marsh would be the "operating companies that will be affected most significantly by these actions" MMC said.

The move is designed to "enhance operational efficiencies and improve profitability".

MMC plans to save annualised savings of about $350m by the end of 2008 by company-wide changes in IT infrastructure, real estate and corporate functions such as finance, human resources and procurement.

"The changes announced today will improve the ability of MMC's operating companies," MMC said.

"While these savings include managed attrition and staff reductions of approximately 750 currently identified positions, the majority of the savings will be achieved from more efficient processes."

MMC plans savings from targeted profit enhancement initiatives and business process and organisation improvements at the operating company level.

The firm declined to give a breakdown of how many people will go from Mercer or from where.

In August MMC described Mercer's profitability figures in the second quarter as "disappointing" and said it was "addressing" the issue - according to the spokesman this was completely unrelated to MMC's current move.