The nation's third-largest provider of mobile phones and services has had a tough year. So tough, in fact, that it lost gobs of money in the most recent quarter and has told its employees that if they want to quit, they are more than welcome to leave.Sprint lost $326 million in the third quarter. Not a good showing for the company, which has struggled over the last 18 months to find a real connection with customers. It brought new CEO Dan Hesse on board with the hopes of turning the company around, as it has faced customer defections and continued difficulty in integrating its iDEN and CDMA cellular networks.

In light of the worsening economic climate, Sprint has asked employees to consider a voluntary layoff program. Details of what the program entails and what departments are affected have not been provided, though the Kansas City Star reports that non-customer-facing departments, such as sales teams, are involved.

"No one is being forced to do anything," a Sprint spokeswoman said. "There are no forced reductions. There are no layoffs in store. It's a matter of employees having the option to exercise discretion. No targets have been announced."

Sprint has 57,000 employees at the moment and has not said how many of them were offered the layoff package. The workers in question have until Dec. 3 to decide. Depending on how many voluntarily choose to walk out the door, Sprint will evaluate and explore its next steps. Whether or not that will include mandatory layoffs or other form of headcount reduction is not known.

On the plus side, Sprint's customer service reputation has rebounded somewhat because of renewed efforts on that side of the business.

Sprint has also finally launched its Xohm WiMax network, and the merger of Xohm and Clearwire was recently approved by the FCC.