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Chesapeake Energy Offers Buyouts to 275 Employees
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio -- Chesapeake Energy Corp. announced late Friday it is offering buyouts -- a “voluntary separation program,” the company says -- to 275 employees “as part of the company’s ongoing efforts to improve efficiencies and reduce costs.”
The buyouts are being offered to employees who meet criteria based upon a combination of age and years of Chesapeake service. Eligible employees will have 45 days to consider the offer. Those employees who choose it leave the company in February. Chesapeake said it retains the right to temporarily delay key employees' departures to ensure appropriate staffing levels to meet business needs.
Said Martha A. Burger, Chesapeake’s senior vice president – human and corporate resources, “This program is designed to give our longer-term employees the chance to benefit from their years of service to Chesapeake while furthering our efforts to maximize corporate performance and maintain our leadership role in this competitive and constantly evolving industry.”
Chesapeake employs 13,000, about 4,800 at its corporate headquarters in Oklahoma City.
The website for Oklahoma’s National Public Radio, printed an email to employees from Chesapeake’s senior vice president, Henry J. Hood, that said employees who accept the buyout offer would get one year’s pay and stock benefits.
Wrote Hood, according to the report, “As you know, the past year or so has been particularly tough on the natural gas industry. Although natural gas prices have recovered a bit, we believe the sustained low natural gas price environment we have seen will have an effect on the levels of activity in our industry and at Chesapeake for some time to come. That means we must continue to focus on initiatives designed to control expenses and maximize performance so that we are able to maintain our leadership role in this changing and competitive industry.”
Earlier this week Chesapeake announced another the sale of $2 billion worth of midstream assets, including its ownership interests in gas processing and pipeline projects under development in the Utica shale play. The company previously announced $11.1 billion in asset sales.
In an attempt to plug its debt, primarily incurred from buying leasehold positions, Chesapeake plans to sell nearly $20 billion in assets by the end of 2013.
Published by The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
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