Operational Excellence (OPEX) Daily Briefing – Wednesday, October 29, 2025: UPS Cuts 48,000 Jobs: Workforce Restructuring or Flow Restructuring? An OPEX Lesson from UPS
Điểm Tin Operational Excellence (OPEX) Mỗi Ngày – Thứ Tư, Ngày 29/10/2025: UPS Cắt Giảm 48.000 Nhân Sự: Tái Cấu Trúc Nhân Sự Hay Tái Cấu Trúc Dòng Chảy? Bài Học OPEX Từ UPS.
Welcome to my unique weekday article for the paid subscriber-only edition.
Operational Excellence (OPEX) Daily Briefing – issued on weekdays (Monday to Friday).
Điểm tin Operational Excellence (OPEX) hằng ngày (phát hành các ngày thứ Hai đến thứ Sáu).
This is the bilingual post in English and Vietnamese. Vietnamese is below.
Đây là bài viết song ngữ Anh-Việt. Tiếng Việt ở bên dưới.
English
Part 1: Official Statement – UPS Executes the Largest Restructuring in Its 117-Year History
On October 28, 2025, United Parcel Service (UPS) — the 117-year-old American logistics giant — officially announced a plan to cut 48,000 jobs globally during the 2025 fiscal year. This marks the largest restructuring in the company’s history, reflecting UPS’s determination to streamline its organization, reduce operating costs, and strengthen competitiveness amid rising industry pressures from soaring expenses, declining delivery volumes, and fierce competition from Amazon Logistics and FedEx.
(Sources: AP News, Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, CNN Business, WTAE Pittsburgh – October 28–29, 2025)
According to the Q3 2025 financial report, the restructuring will affect 34,000 operational positions (including staff in distribution centers, warehouses, and delivery networks) and 14,000 management positions. This initiative is part of UPS’s “Network of the Future” program — a global network redesign focused on sorting automation, route optimization, and the closure of underperforming facilities.
CEO Carol Tomé stated that the strategy’s goal is to “build a smaller, faster, and smarter organization,” emphasizing that UPS will continue to invest heavily in digital technologies to enhance productivity and operational accuracy.
The company expects to save over $2.2 billion in 2025 through restructuring measures, including reduced warehouse leasing costs, automated sorting hubs, and consolidated delivery operations.
Immediately after the announcement, UPS shares rose by more than 8%, indicating investor confidence in the company’s ability to restore profit margins after a period of rising operational expenses. However, analysts warned that such large-scale downsizing could jeopardize performance and service quality if not accompanied by process improvement and system redesign.
From the perspective of Operational Excellence (OPEX), UPS’s decision is not merely a financial measure but a strategic inflection point. Cutting headcount alone does not equal optimization. Before reducing people, organizations must reduce waste in their flow — the bottlenecks, redundant steps, and non–value-added activities embedded within operations.
This reflects the core Lean/OPEX philosophy: eliminate waste before eliminating people, because cutting the wrong element can erode efficiency faster than any short-term cost savings can compensate for.
Therefore, UPS’s move is more than just a record-breaking layoff — it’s a wake-up call for the global logistics industry. In an era of rising costs and accelerating automation, true efficiency doesn’t come from doing less — it comes from doing better.