Apple Says it “Messed Up” in Retail Hiring Formula, But Didn’t Lay Anyone Off

Apple said it “messed up” in its recent round of hiring, but denies claims that the company laid off any new retail employees.

Earlier this week, Mac Rumors reported that Apple had laid off several new hires around the world (mainly the United Kingdom) and cut the hours of part-timers significantly in the retail sector. Some of the new employees had just finished their training programs and had been with the company as little as six months.

Apple recently responded to these claims, saying that the company hasn’t laid off anyone. It did, however, implement a new hiring formula for its retail stores over the past few months and said that it “messed up” in doing so. The company is now trying to reverse this formula, which has resulted in large cuts in retail hours.

“Making these changes was a mistake and the changes are being reversed,” said Kristin Huguet, Apple spokeswoman. “Our employees are our most important asset and the ones who provide the world-class service our customers deserve.”

John Browett, senior vice president of Apple Retail, was indeed behind the idea (as previously suspected). Browett is the new guy on the team, having come from UK-based Dixons Retail electronics stores in April 2012.

Browett was praised for conducting an internal review when first joining Apple, which led to raises as high as 25 percent for retail employees as well as certain hardware discounts.

He tried to put a new staffing formula in place, but obviously that didn’t work out too well. Browett is now telling leadership teams to tell employees that “we messed up.”

Mac Rumors still insists that the company laid off employees, since it has heard from actual retail workers themselves. But this looks to be a foggy area in the whole fiasco. 

Updated at 4:43pm EST
ifoAppleStore.com has detailed account of the waves Browett has been making in Apple’s Retail stores since his arrival. It appears that Browett has been trying a bit too hard to change many aspects of Apple’s Retail Stores that have made them so successful in an effort to save a few bucks here and there.