In difficult times internal communication is critical. 12/12/08 09:24 Filed in: blog We cannot turn on the television, or pick up a newspaper without more news of economic doom and gloom.
With talk of businesses closing and redundancies, it is important to keep your people informed. What is the current situation for the organisation? What are the challenges we face? What is our strategy to overcome them? How to keep your employees motivated in a downturn. When times are tough it's tempting for business owners and managers to put engagement initiatives to one side and focus on organisational pressures.
However, this is precisely the time when actively engaging with your employees is most critical as they will be scrutinising and judging leadership behaviour even more closely. There is plentiful research to highlight the positive correlation between engaged employees and increased performance. The flipside being that companies with a less engaged workforce experience higher staff turnover, greater absence levels, more internal disruption and less discretionary effort, all of which inevitably impacts on the bottom line. The key is to create an environment where employees genuinely feel engaged and involved, where there is a sense of collective responsibility and employees believe they have a degree of control over their destiny. • To be effective, communication should be comprehensive, credible and two-way.
Www.workwisecommunication.com/docs/HBA.pdf. It's not just about the money. Bad Ways to Deliver Bad News. Don't start me talkin' I'll tell everything I know I'm gonna break up this signified Somebody's got to go – Sonny Boy Williamson As HR professionals, we all know by now that bad news that directly affects employees should be delivered face-to-face, don't we?
Unfortunately, sometimes despite our best intentions, things still go awry. It's bad enough that there are record layoffs these days, but why do we keep hearing horror stories of how people are let go...it's sad to say, but shouldn't we be getting good at this by now? First, a news release is not an employee communication channel, yet how many employees hear of major changes in their organization from the media instead of their manager? Intake.insidedge.net » Blog Archive » Reduce stress: Communicate during times of change and uncertainty. Internal Communication Strategies During a Recession. Internal Communication Strategies for a Downturn: Recession means uncertainty.
Layoff communications essentials: Before, during, and after. There is no end to plant closings and layoffs, whether in good economic times or bad ones.
How a company conveys this awful news reflects its values. Every situation is unique, but here are communication guidelines I hope you never need. 1. Avoid a "bolt from the blue. " Brief employees on the condition of your business regularly so that a cutback does not blindside them. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. A picture says a thousand words… A picture says a thousand words… What happens when an organisation enters into redundancy talks?
How do employees feel and how do they express their points of view? Well, according to employees at Thwaites Brewery in Blackburn, UK they reportedly decided to spell it out for all to see just days after the firm announced redundancies. (My thanks to @too_much_joel who tweeted me the pic on Saturday morning). The iconic sign mysteriously found the letters H, I and E had disappeared, which left a rude word shining out across the town on Friday.
According to a statement from the firm that was published on Saturday, a spokesperson said: “The lights at the brewery were affected for a very short time on Friday. Paying attention to the attention economy. Most of us are happily obsessed with the economy of money.
We earn it and we spend it and we generally pay attention to what things cost. Certainly, salespeople and marketers are truly focused on the price of things, on commissions and shelving allowances and net margin and the cost of goods sold. With all of these easily measured activity, it's easy to overlook the fast-growing and ever more important economy based around attention. "If I alert my entire customer base, how much will this cost me in permission? " "How much time do we save our customers with a better written manual? " "When we fail to ask for (and reward) the privilege of following up, are we wasting permission? " "Does launching this product to an audience of strangers waste the attention we're going to have to buy? " Thoughts For Tuesday - Employee Communication in Challenging Economic Times. August 16, 2011 Employee Communication in Challenging Economic Times Until just a few weeks ago, most of us felt that the worst of the economic downturn was probably behind us.
Even if our friends or spouses hadn't yet found new jobs, our companies had stabilized, corporate profits were strong, and the stock market was enjoying a steady climb. Then, suddenly Congress failed to address the debt crisis, Standard and Poors issued its downgrade and markets started plummeting. The nation plunged back into that old, familiar, sickening feeling. Intake.insidedge.net » Blog Archive » Remembering the Basics During Uncertain Times.