How to deal with 23% pay cut

As if the workplace hasn't been interesting enough at the Boston Globe, which had threatened to close, its employees now face the double death watch of having their salaries cut by 23% as their paper is put up for sale.

The New York Times Co. has hired an investment bank to sell the Boston Globe, a move similar to what my former employer, Knight Ridder, did in 2005. The newspaper chain was sold about four months later, and a spinoff and a little more than a year later, I was laid off at one of its newspapers.

The four months or so between the sale announcement and the sale was some of the most stressful, difficult periods of my career, and I can only wish the Globe staff good luck in the coming months.

But their dilemma caused me to think of what they can do -- prepare how best to deal with the 23% pay cuts the newspaper is imposing on nearly 700 employees. The move was announced late Monday night after members of the Boston Newspaper Guild narrowly rejected a contract to cut $20 million through new employment contracts.