dead wood

See also: deadwood and Deadwood

English

Pronunciation

• Audio (AU):

  (file)

Noun

dead wood (uncountable)

1. (uncountable, idiomatic, management) Personnel no longer contributing to an organization.
   • 2001, Michael B. Arthur, Denise M. Rousseau, The Boundaryless Career: A New Employment Principle for a New Organizational Era, Oxford University Press (→ISBN), page 140:

     Everybody knows that when you have a layoff, you use it as chance to get rid of the people you wanted to get rid of anyway, but couldn't document or hadn't bothered documenting as bad employees […] . If you don't have much dead wood, you hope they make you use a seniority list, because then you can say it's out of your control.

2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see dead,‎ wood.

Derived terms

• put the dead wood on

See also

• clean house
• deadwood
• Deadwood