What Are We Communicating about Challenging Times?

Author: Dave Crisp

23 Jan

In tough times, it’s easy for leaders to inadvertently communicate negatives that come back to bite a lot faster than expected. Barack Obama has been a model of consistency with messages of hope even while making the point the US is deeply challenged.

Unfortunately most managers worry about justifying layoffs or cuts they believe have to be made. So they emphasize the intensity of the crisis. How else, they reason, will employees recognize that managers don’t want and didn’t expect to take some of the tough actions, but they must? This risks convincing staff the company is a sinking ship they should consider abandoning if they have the chance and that management is weak for not panning better.

A far better course is to communicate it’s business as usual… prudently choosing contingency plans to fit a tough market and trimming carefully in keeping with what everyone knows are growing challenges as we are all too used to hearing. Efforts to minimize layoffs are noticed. The main message has to be confidence, that we have a plan.

You also have to anticipate that as information gets relayed through layers of supervisors their fears and interpretations lean toward the worst more often than in good times. Senior leaders can buffer this by anticipating it, emphasizing the need to give a balanced message and taking the time to answer middle management’s questions in greater detail than usual. These aren’t idle questions, but ones they will need to know how to answer the moment the step back into their departments.

Wrong answers have a greater impact in times of stress and fear than positive ones and are most easily acted on by your best people. They are the ones most likely to make firm decisions quickly… and you don’t want them deciding to take an offer from someone else. Other companies are looking to poach to replace three or four laggards with your superstar… so a lot depends on motivating those you want to keep. Yet many managers secretly believe everyone will be happy just to have a job. That belief will show in their neglect of communicating motivating information even to key people.

Bookmark and share this post

More »

2 Comments

Filed under: 1 Balance - Judgment, 2 Positive - Feelings, Business/Strategy, Current Affairs

Job Searching in Tough Times

Author: Dave Crisp

20 Jan

More of my work lately is with job seekers, naturally. We’re in that cycle of the economy. So what can I say that’s reassuring? A lot actually.

First, I often am introduced for my success in handling some major mergers, not easy when 80% are known to fail, mostly for "HR" reasons – poor culture fit, bad leadership, etc. What I point out is that most of the layoffs I had to manage – and there were many in the turbulent retail years I held a senior role there… most occurred in good times, not in recessions. Layoffs don’t only occur in tough times nor does hiring only occur in good periods. Both go on all the time. It’s simply a matter that there are a few more in one or the other.

I got the watershed job in my own career history the very day a major city newspaper emblazoned this headline on page 1: Worst Job Market in 20 Years (the height of the 1982 recession). And I’m not the greatest job hunter, being basically a shy, non-marketing type. "If I can do it, you can," is a pretty accurate message.

In most years average turnover is about 15% – one job in six has to be refilled. Most are filled from within… in good times… and then replaced by hiring junior staff. This background rate of turnover doesn’t vary too much in bad times. And when many companies lay off, they inevitably find just afterward that turnover continues. Other companies are grabbing their best people hoping to fill growing gaps with better players; your own company cut to the bone and didn’t anticipate continuing routine departures of people they depend on. They still have to hire.

While it’s true that relatively speaking it will probably take longer to get a job (managers who might average 3 to 5 months searching might need 6 to 9), they will inevitably find work. Those who keep looking will at least! Of course that’s hard on people. No one likes to envision such lengthy periods without pay, but allowing for just a bit of luck, severance packages, outplacement counseling and good planning really do help.

By the time layoff are decided, paperwork processed and job searches are fully underway (usually 2 to 3 months), don’t forget that we’re that much closer to the upturn. Those laid off early may have longer searches, but they’re more fully networked and closer to finding work earlier in the upturn than those laid off later, who take a few months to get well started. So even though layoffs may continue for a while, it isn’t all doom and gloom for everyone. Those who keep their heads, stay focused and pursue all leads as consistently as they can usually end up with better jobs that the ones they left.

It’s not a time to panic and jump at the very first job offer… unless it’s a great one. Steady, logical work pays off all the way through the process from networking to negotiating the offer. It’s just a bit tougher to stay positive. As always balancing pressures and alternatives is the key to coming out on top.

Bookmark and share this post

More »

1 Comment

Filed under: 1 Balance - Judgment, 2 Positive - Feelings, 5 Habits - Action, Building A Career, Coaching Yourself

HR Paradoxes Stand Out in Tough Times

Author: Dave Crisp

18 Jan

Prepping for several presentations this week reminded me again of some of the painful paradoxes we routinely witness in human resources (HR) areas that are specifically highlighted in tough times. Here are some in no particular order.

The first knee-jerk reaction in many companies is serious lay-offs. In good times these would generally please stock analysts because they seem to cut the cost base and therefore should increase profits, but when they’re done in tough times, they’re more of a last grasp at survival and won’t have that positive effect. Moreover, they cost a lot – a sudden cash outflow for severance and notice pay… and you inevitably lose a number of excellent people. You can’t identify, nor can you automatically be sure you’re removing, the so-called ‘deadwood’ (lovely way to refer to staff), right?

So you end up short staffed in some areas and still over-staffed for the moment in others. You can’t simply shuffle the extras into the gaps. It never quite works out as you want or anticipate. Even before the inevitable upturn comes you have to madly try to hire great replacements just when everyone else is trying, too. Cost savings haven’t even begun by this time because you’re still paying for terminations and now you’ve got to pay more to hire. Especially this time we’re going to come out into a very tight hiring market due to boomer retirements and the massively growing need for better leadership for flatter, more dispersed organizations. And by the way, no one will trust you due to massive layoff hangover.

So what should you do? I’m all for biting the bullet in a number of ways. Beef up performance discussions and use them as a basis for carefully chosen lay-offs on a much smaller scale. Two or three months of performance focus usually identifies and justifies focused departures. Don’t be so sure a big across-the-board cut now is the answer. Focus more on performance and positioning people for better performance when things start to turn so you’re early out of the gate with better leaders and better teams revved up to succeed against weakened competitors. Spend some money on training the right people. Use the time you should have ’spare’ from lesser workloads. Don’t fill everyone’s time with scurrying to find cuts or justify not cutting in their areas. You’ll just stress them and tire them out for when you need them at full speed in the upturn.

When things start to pick up, don’t automatically start hiring. Use your improved skills to absorb the work through increased productivity – gaps that weaker companies have to fill by rapid hiring and the mistakes that they will inevitably make as a result. You can always hire when the burst of panic hiring is waning and people who took the first job that came along are becoming dissatisfied.

Does this paint a picture? Those companies that don’t react with panic either in the down- or the upturns have a much greater chance of doing things better than the competition. A recession can be a golden opportunity to position yourselves for a far more secure future. But, of course, most companies argue that this is all very logical, they just can’t. Sadly, for some that’s true, but for others, they just aren’t looking at the logical time frames that such relatively slow HR processes inevitably take. If layoffs today meant cost-savings tomorrow morning, panic might work. But in the months these things take to roll out, times will start to change. Don’t get caught like so many rolling with exactly the wrong waves at the wrong moments.

Does this sound familiar? Successful organizations don’t manage today, they manage tomorrow. A little planning and courage go a long way toward making better leadership.

Bookmark and share this post

More »

0 Comments

Filed under: 3 Strategic - Thinking, Building A Career, Business/Strategy, Current Affairs, Human Resources (HR)

HR and Organization in Tough Times

Author: Dave Crisp

10 Jan

The economic downturn is challenging human resources (HR) departments in a number of ways. Useful and not so useful ideas are arriving from many directions. Strategically the challenge should be clear – save your company (reduce costs is the only fast way since building revenue is a longer process) AND ALSO position it for the future upturn (and staff shortage) that are sure to follow.

Doing either of these alone misses the point.

A great example is quoted in a McKinsey Quarterly article (a summary – full article requires free registration). Cisco reduced 8500 positions by using the change to improve their structure, making jobs more interesting and rewarding and thus boosting productivity and engagement of staff. Such combined solutions should always be HR’s goal.

Sounds easy, doesn’t it? Unfortunately it’s rare that both goals can be accomplished in the same time frame, but Cisco is big enough, agile enough and likely had enough redundancy as a result of continuing success to be able to achieve this sort of change. One of the most frustrating arguments I lost as an HR VP was with a division head who intended just such a move, but in the interests of financial goals decided to lay off 200 people now… but only implement the new systems to make the work possible for the remainder about 8 to 12 months down the road. The ultimate cost was a stressed out survivor group who were extremely angry and unhappy. They couldn’t do their jobs effectively and felt like failures constantly. The new systems really never caught up and the company floundered.

The challenge most companies face is they don’t have the spare room in resources or headcount to begin with. They’ve been cutting even during the boom to make profits appear to increase continually as the market always demands. If their profit drive wasn’t based on a balanced strategy – increasing revenues, reducing costs, balancing workload simultaneously all along, it’s unlikely they can suddenly see ways to do it now.

Even Toyota, who have continuously achieved the dual goals is caught short and has had to reduce… but at least they’ve always used contract positions they could eliminate temporarily. That still means people out of work, but at least they are those who understood the precarious nature of their employment, so that trust is not so disrupted as it is in companies who hired full time, permanent staff and now are laying off. When the latter attempt to rehire, many will be suspicious of hollow promises and will be cynical about implied “security.”

Chances are good that organizations like Toyota will be able to cope when there isn’t sufficient work temporarily for their full time team by reducing hours and overtime, holding off on new costs, accepting lower results without feeling the need to strip investments that will affect the future potential for growth and using ’spare’ time of full time staff who aren’t as busy for training and other future-oriented activities, which could well include the sort of organizational and job restructuring that Cisco managed.

The message is these ideas don’t come easily, nor overnight. A single CEO isn’t likely to envision nor be able to order specific changes that “fix” all their problems. It takes good will, many people’s ideas and considerable trial and error to come up with such creative, positive solutions in crises. Those factors don’t come into existence by command in a short time.

Bookmark and share this post

More »

0 Comments

Filed under: 1 Balance - Judgment, 3 Strategic - Thinking, Leaders of the Future, Learning Organization

HR wisdom from unlikely sources

Author: Dave Crisp

1 Jan

Oddly I’ve never truly appreciated holidays. They interrupt routine, which as a Zen philosopher I hold in high regard. Routine helps you build steadily, day by day, toward your goals. Nevertheless, breaks inevitably lead to unusual insights you wouldn’t typically stumble on and evoke great memories forgotten.

Two in particular come to mind this season. Vertex One, an unusual Canadian investment company, always sends an unusual book to its clients. This year: A History of the World in 6 Glasses by Tom Standage. His “first glass” describes plausibly how beer likely was one of the great forces pushing humans to create cities, leaving behind 150,000 years of wandering in hunter-gatherer bands virtually overnight a mere 10,000 years ago. From there we’ve evolved the amazing science, technology and organizations that offer us totally different lives today. Yet beer continues to exert an influence. Such time scales change the way we look at our present, miraculous information evolution in less than a generation via the Internet. I would never have thought such a book would be worth reading, let alone the source of numerous amazing insights.

That led to recalling the phrase “remember how unlikely is your birth” – each one of us being entirely unique. Shaped by millions of interwoven circumstances, we’re both significant and amazingly insignificant in the grand flow of time and the universe. This is a line from a Monty Python song from one of my favorite movies, highly irreverent “The Meaning of Life,” mostly forgotten in the daily flow of minute by minute.

It’s one of those ‘you have to see it’ things. Fortunately you can, though whether it should be legally free is another puzzling question from our instant communication revolution. It’s here on YouTube via Stumbleupon, another Canadian success story.

The best part of holidays for me is the time to ponder the imponderable. I’m always glad to get back to practical challenges, but with a new perspective. Have a great new year!

Bookmark and share this post

More »

0 Comments

Filed under: 2 Positive - Feelings, 3 Strategic - Thinking, All That We Know, Science

Archive for January, 2009

What Are We Communicating about Challenging Times?

Job Searching in Tough Times

HR Paradoxes Stand Out in Tough Times

HR and Organization in Tough Times

HR wisdom from unlikely sources

Blog Categories

Recent Comments

Site Pages/Articles

Blogroll

Archives