Another international crisis …
Another opportunity for leaders to make a positive impact in their companies.
How you behave and communicate in a crisis will affect:
- Current productivity/results
- Future productivity/results via who “comes and goes”
For current impacts, leaders can help by addressing immediate fears (see previous article https://novusleadershipinstitute.com/2022/04/11/the-only-thing-we-have-to-fear-is-2/) and needs:
- visibly leading by example,
- acknowledging fears or direct impacts/needs people may have, and
- clear and transparent communication.
The future impact is more subtle but the effects are longer lasting. People will make judgments about the company based on how leaders behave during the crisis.
Central to those judgments is attractiveness of the company as an employer:
– Current employees – should I stay with the company?
– Prospective employees – should I join the company if there’s an opportunity?
A significant factor affecting attractiveness is “clear and transparent communication.” Are leaders communicating what effects, if any, the crisis has on the company? And by extension, can employees trust leaders in the future about anything affecting employees?
Leaders have a few basic choices in communicating company and individual impacts:
1. Say nothing, especially if there are negative impacts.
2. Say something, but not everything.
3. Disclose current and anticipated impacts along with plans.
4. Disclose impacts and plans, plus any uncertainties about the future and related plans.
There can be many considerations for each choice; here are a few:
For the first choice, the typical hope is that any bad stuff will go away and employees won’t “notice” any issues. Employees will notice! And they will form their own conclusions, which may not be realistic nor what leaders hope for.
The second choice is similar to the first. The underlying fear is driving employees away or reducing productivity. Employees will notice, and will form their own conclusions about what is not communicated. Additionally, partial communication will often taken as intentional misleading. That can make the second case worse than the first.
For the third and fourth choices, confidence in and attractiveness of the company can increase. The fourth choice is the “full” disclosure path, acknowledging that leaders may not have all the answers. If communication hasn’t been open in the past, these choices also need to acknowledge the past and why the change, so leadership intent is clear. Otherwise, the change in communication itself might create unease or distrust.
Ultimately, the issue is whether leaders trust employees to make decisions for themselves about their own well-being.
Withholding information affecting employees creates a culture that makes decisions for employees. Some employees may be O.K. with that, others – and probably most – will not be.
How are you doing?
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