Poetry at Work, Chapter 17: The Poet Blogs the Layoff

Layoffs were coming. The big announcement from the CEO was circulated by email. It was a masterpiece of vagueness. It didn’t say how many people would be affected. It didn’t say when the affected people would know. It did say there would be a severance program, although it included no details. 

In short, the important things people wanted to know weren’t communicated. I’m sure management congratulated itself on communicating, but the rumors had already been circulating and people were already far beyond “layoffs are coming.” What people also knew was that the people being laid off might be the fortunate ones. Those who remained would likely be reorganized, with more work and fewer people to get it done.

Having been through this before at another company, I had a better idea of what would happen and what people really cared about that colleagues who hadn’t been through it, especially younger colleagues. A small group came to me and asked if I would consider blogging about my past experience on the company’s intranet. I said I’d think about it.

To continue reading, please see my post today at Literary Life.

Employee or Leadership Engagement

The article below was first published Aug. 3 at InsideWork.net.

The other day, a group of us at work were having a conference call with a representative of an industry association. The association is actually useful—a collection of companies big and small who talk with each other about communications, sponsor studies, get consulting help and learn how others tackle similar problems. This organization also says it facilitates the sharing of best practices and key learnings, but I’ll forgive them for that.

One of our number asked the rep if there was any one question she was hearing from senior executives of member companies, any particular issue or concern or desire for information. In other words, “What’s on the minds of American corporate leaders about communication right now?” My first thought was that her answer would be “social media,” the current hot button in corporate communications. But I was wrong.

She said that there was one question that was coming up over and over again. And the question was—how do we get employees engaged?

The rep said this was the single biggest issue for member companies of all sizes, and some were beginning to sound desperate. They had tried everything – town halls, small group meetings with executives, special newsletters, one-on-one conversations and internal blogs. They had “segmented their target audiences” and “refined their key messages”—but nothing was working.

So I asked her a question: how many of those companies had recently been or were currently going through layoffs?

“Oh, about 80 percent of them,” she said.

So here’s a learning we can all share, and maybe one day it will become a best practice: When an organization is laying people off, employee engagement—with the business, with customers, with suppliers, with market conditions and competitors—is going to suffer, and for a considerable period of time.

Employees won’t get engaged until they know the answers to four questions:

1. Do I have a job?
2. Do the people I work with have jobs?
3. Is my organization changing, and what does the new one look like? And
4. Will I be expected to do significantly more work because there are fewer people?

Once those questions are answered and understood, then, and only then, can an organization realistically begin to entertain ideas of employee engagement.

When there are layoffs, answering those questions can take months, if not longer.

A more interesting question to me is, how could senior executives at so many companies not know this?

After the conference call, a few of us talked about it. And there is at least one answer.

At many organizations, leadership defines “interacting with employees” as town hall meetings, email broadcasts, and maybe a video or two. When leaders of such an organization decide they must lay off people, whatever the reason might be (even substantive ones), they make the decision and then move on. Their thinking is often six months to a year down the road. They decide to lay people off, and assign Human Resources and people managers to implement the decision. For the leaders, it’s a done deal and time to think about everything else they need to do. (It’s also unpleasant and often messy.)

The affected employees, on the other hand, are at the very beginning of the process. Sometimes it’s quick. Usually it takes at least weeks, but more often months. So if your own individual status with your employer is unclear, and you could lose your job, you’ll be less prone to take risks, create new programs, suggest changes or innovations that could save money, or volunteer for anything. Why should you? In fact, there’s an argument to be made that it would be irrational for employees to do anything else except hunker down and wait it out. Or find another job elsewhere, if that’s an option.

So there’s the rub. Employees are in the here and now. Leadership is in the future, and mystified about why employees aren’t engaged. If leadership gets addicted to layoffs as a routine form of cost savings, the problem will never disappear.

The solution lies with leadership engaging with employees in the here and now. Routinely. Walking around. Talking. Drawing people into conversation. Challenging people. Not letting HR be your conduit for feedback. Listening.

Leaders engage first. Ask Jesus.

Update: Blogging on Layoffs

Trying something different to help communicate layoffs at work, we've been posting articles on our intranet this week. So far, two have been posted, one about a layoff I experienced 10 years ago at another company, and the other about how my family reacted.

The response so far has been, well, what you might expect it to be. Both posts have been read. A lot. I've had people stop by my office, call on the phone and send emails. Several have posted comments on the blog. One person said that the first post had "gone viral" in their 1000+ department. One employee posted a heartfelt response and then accepted our invitation to write his own blog post.

The real understanding came yesterday afternoon, when I was called by one of the company switchboard operators, who was asking the right place to direct a reporter who had called. I told her, and then she said, "I read your blog post." She hesitated, and then said, "It was good. Thanks."

The important thing the blog posts have done have been to say it's OK to talk about this, that we're all feeling the same concerns and fears. They also underscore we have management that's not typical.

Two more posts are scheduled for next week: what happens when you're not laid off, and networking in a totally networked world.

Blogging on Layoffs

Today at work, we started blogging on what it means to be laid off. We have some 900 layoffs coming, beginning in late August, and there hasn't been much communication while the process is underway. We have a lot of younger employees who've never been through this before, and anxiety is running high.

So I blogged my own layoff 10 years ago. We posted it on our intranet. The response has been amazing -- the blog post clearly touched a chord with a lot of people. I've gotten emails and phone calls, and vague reports of the post "going viral" in parts of the company.

Standard operating procedure is don't talk about it. We're trying something different.

The first post was about what happened. Next will be questions you get from family and friends. Then we'll have a post by someone who went through the process but didn't get laid off. And then one on why networking is so important, and all of the various ways it's done today.

I'll provide an update on what happens.