Sickness has been a bit of a theme for me in the last 24 hours.
My baby daughter Erin appears to have picked up the norovirus. Which for those of you who don’t know is a particularly nasty vomiting bug. I challenge any of you not to have your heart strings pulled by an 11 month old smiling at you weakly. Just seconds after projectile vomiting the entire contents of her stomach.
As she was sitting wanly looking up at me I was watching my football team Celtic lose. Less than 24 hours after making the headlines by signing Robbie Keane. The football cliche “as sick as a parrot” could not be more appropriate.
Yesterday also happened to be the day which most of us see as being the ideal day to take a “sickie”. I found this slighty odd as early February in the UK is hardly balmy. Then again it’s getting towards the end of a very long cold and dark winter.
I guess that’s where the employer needs to do more. We should all have a compelling reason to get out of bed in the morning. We all need to make work more meaningful. Don’t get me wrong I’m not expecting us all to be like Jerry Maguire’s guru in the Tom Cruise movie. I don’t expect us to bounce out of bed on a grey, dreech winter’s morning.
But by the time we’ve hit the snooze button for the second time. We should have found good reason to get our backsides to work.
There was belated joy (or perhaps simple relief) last week as the UK finally emerged from the longest recession since records began. So can we expect the narrative to now be about “growth”, “”upturn” and “recovery”?
Maybe.
But I would also expect to see a lot of other words beginning with “R”. Like restructure. Or reorganisation. Or redundancies. Recent announcements from AZ and GSK are unlikely to be the last big announcements this year.
We’ve spent a lot of time working with big organisations on redundancy programmes. We’ve gathered a number of lessons in that time. So, we’ve pulled our thoughts together into a short ”how to” document. In summary the 5 key things we’ve learnt are:
1. Think about the context and tone
Say what the change is not about as well as what it is
At the start of the process explain the rationale, process and key timings
Tell people where more information can be found and how they can ask questions
Set expectations about what can / can not be shared as part of the consultation process
Avoid being overly legal in tone - try to keep it warm and human
2. Design a rigorous approach to supporting “at risk” employees
Decide what support / advice will be available to colleagues who are “at risk” of redundancy and tell them about this support as soon as possible
Ensure that local managers are well prepared (in advance) for redundancy announcements and that they are able to explain the process and next steps in more details
For people who are impacted pre-arrange 1:1 meetings with their manager (too often these meetings take too long to set up after the initial announcement - causing anxiety and uncertainty)
3. Decide what support / guidance you will provide to managers
Provide managers with support materials inlcuding information about the process and likely Q&As which may come up
Provide managers with access to counsel / advice. Remember many of them may not have gone through this before.
4. Plan how you will interact with the Unions and Employee Forums
Decide who in the leadership team will lead the interactions with the Unions and Employee Forums
If you have had an historically difficult relationship with the Unions make sure you handle it with care and sensitivity. And have a rapid-fire response ready just in case there are any leaks.
Think about how the role / status of the Employee Forum will be positioned next to the Union
5. Be proactive in ensuring that employees remain motivated and focused
The emphasis is rightly on “at-risk” employees. However, ensure there is also a focus on messages to employees who will remain part of the organisation.
Acknowledge the loss. People may be losing friends they have known for years (and may be feeling guily - known as “survivor syndrome”).
Thank everyone for their hard work.
As soon as is appropriate provide a focus for the future and engage people around the new organisation.
If you’re facing up to the prospect of communciating about job losses I hope you found that useful. We will happily send you the full “how to” document if you email me at scott.mckenzie@hillandknowlton.com to request it.
Banks are going to be smaller. Irrespective of whether that makes them less profitable. And that’s one of the interesting things here. The assumption appears to be that the profit motive is inherently wrong.
Don’t get me wrong certain Banks (and bankers) have a lot to answer for in the way they went about making those profits. They have exposed the world economy to a deep recession.
But let me give a slightly different perspective here. And I know Bankers and Banks are about as popular as Traffic Wardens right now. Or maybe Estate Agents.
Not all people working for banks are getting £1m bonuses. I spent 10 years of my career working in Financial Services (much of it with banks now at least partly in Government ownership). Many of the people I met work part time in local branches. Many of them are working mothers. Many of them are earning far less than £20k per year. They are generally good people.
So when we use the term “bankers” as a synonym for “fat cat” I have to take issue with it.
Banks have a right to exist. They are an essential part of the fabric of our society. Not just because of the good work they do in local communities. Or the large amounts they have given to charities over many years. Their profitablity is essential to the ongoing employment of hundreds of thousands of people in this country. And the long term health of many pension funds.
The Banks have quite simply failed to make the case for their ongoing value to society. And so they get kicked from pillar to post.
Yes some banking executives have made some catastrophic mistakes. But in my view we need to stop demonising the banking industry.
Sadly, in the run up to a General Election here in the UK this issue is only going to get more political. The season of bank-bashing will go on.
The news that yet another British titan of business is about to go into foreign ownership has been met with a collective groan from commentators. The Daily Express has even started its own campaign to keep Cadbury in British hands.
I’m not going to comment on whether Cadbury should be British-owned - although do feel slightly uneasy about the idea of national champions.
I’m more interested in the challenge Kraft and indeed the outgoing Cadbury management have in motivating their employees.
There have already been rumours that there will be job losses. Employees have not been slow in expressing their concerns. And we know that public opinion is not currently favouring the deal.
This will undoubtedly create anxiety and uncertainty. And there are likely to be significant constraints about how much Kraft can actually communicate with Cadbury employees right now.
Which could create a vacuum. Soon to be filled with rumours, untruths and speculation.
This is where the outgoing Cadbury leadership could have a role to play. They are closer to their employees (or at least they should be). They will see first hand the concerns their colleagues will have about this deal.
So why not play an active role in dealing with those concerns?
My advice to them is to take part in any employee forums set up as part of the consultation process. Be visible. Walk the factory floor. Listen to the concerns their colleagues have. Be available.
You may ask what their incentive is to do any of this? After all they are not likely to be part of the company’s future.
Well I would simply say that they have made a decision that benefits Cadbury’s shareholders. This may be their primary responsibility. But surely the next is to their colleagues.
P.S. - happy new year and apologies for the radio silence… it’s been a hectic start to 2010 which I think is a good thing!
P.P.S. - if you’re interested in the themes covered in this blog I would also encourage you to visit the recently established CIPR Inside forum.
As many of you know I was lucky enough to host an event last week here at H&K on social media.
We decided to try a slightly different format for the evening breaking the participants into two debate teams. Even the term I use here (”participants” as opposed to “attendees”) has meaning. Whether you’re a fan of social media or not - the one thing it does is drive participation.
One side took the friend of social media position. The other the foe. What followed was a remarkable debate. You can watch the highlights see below:
What struck me was that the proponents of Social Media hit upon an underlying truth. Social Media is the new reality. Opposing it is not wrong. It’s simply irrelevant. You may be an internal communicator battling for your organisation to adopt or even simply acknowledge that social media is in any way useful. My advice is stop.
What you should do is point out that social media is prevalent. And shutting off access to facebook on your systems is like the infamous Maginot Line. A very impressive show of strength. But ultimately futile. Your colleagues will simply find other ways to access it. On work time. You can’t stop them.
For the foes I was impressed by the originality of their arguments. My old friend Matthew from GE had a couple of crowd-pleasing soundbytes. My personal favourite was that social media was simply a tool for “online gossip”.
And of course underneath that lies a serious point. Much of the commentary on blogs and other social media does not constitute expert opinion. If you have access to the internet and have a lot to say then you can howl at the moon (virtually) to your hearts content.
But that doesn’t mean that these ravings don’t have an impact. Or indeed some justification. Ultimately social media is blurring the (already blurred) lines between internal and external communications. Youtr colleagues and consumers are probably talking about your products and services in a virtual chat room right now. The question is would you know about it if they were?
P.S. - well worth looking at my colleague Grant Smith’s take on the event here.
Many of you will have heard me talk about the value I see in generating debate. Not in the stage-managed US Presidential style… or even Prime Ministerial… (!)
I see creating intellgent debate as an opportunity to share learnings and best practices. To find meaning and practical understanding about how you might tackle an issue.
I see part of my role at both H&K (and indeed the CIPR) as being about bringing together a cross-section of people facing similar challenges.
On 1st December we are hosting an event looking at the impact of Social Media here at H&K. I’m sure it will generate fierce debate. I am probably at the more sceptical end of how “useful” Social Media is for Internal Communicators. I think there is an awful lot of unsubstantiated guff being talked about the role Social Media will play in organisational comms going forward… But I digress…
Whether you are a cynic or not you can’t you can’t deny that Social Media is having an impact on the way we live our lives. You may have seen my previous post about the TfL case study. So I do think this is a live issue for Internal Communciators. Whether you know it or not.
Essentially we are asking whether Social Media is our ”friend or foe”? We will run through some really practical tools which will help you assess whether you are getting your approach to Social Media right.
We already have friends, colleagues and clients from organisations like Bank of England, RBS, P&G, the COI and GE attending.
Like all careers mine has seen its highs and lows (so far).
Many years ago I was lucky enough to work with Pete Stevenson and the fantastic team at The Edge . We were working on a project for a big, retail bank. We were planning to launch a major new brand which was going to disrupt the wealth management market. I was Brand Manager and had certainly bought in to the vision the company leadership had sold us.
So my team and I went about developing a brand proposition which we felt was both compelling and unique in the marketplace. We engaged Pete to help us with the internal launch. We created a really polished, considered film. Which was a big hit with our employees and stakeholders.
Unfortunately for me and for my leadership team. The products and services did not really materialise to match up to the brand promise we had developed. Result = major failure. And quite a few redundancies.
It was a major learning for me about the importance of transparency and indeed credibility in communications. Put simply we can not make promises we are not able to keep. It causes too much damage in the long term.
Anyway, I’m happy to say that Pete and I survived that experience. And indeed our paths cross again on the morning of 18 November as The Edge are sponsoring a CIPR event on “Visual Communications”. It will be held at the wonderful BAFTA building on Picadilly. Places are limited so if you do want to get along please contact me, or my good friend Phil Turner at Phil.Turner@GAM.com
My colleague Louise and I have had an ongoing debate recently about the impact of social media on consumers and employees. And where the lines blur. And who has responsiblity within organisations for responding to issues (or even if you should).
Some of you may have received a case study on the TfL employee who abused an elderly gentleman recently. Let me know if you didn’t as I would be happy to send it onto you.
Anyway, after being publically castigated for his behaviour the employee in question has resigned. Clearly he has done wrong. Looking at the video clip I find his attitude offensive. And he deserved to be severely disciplined.
But in this multi-media age I have to ask whether a sense of proportion is required. Anyone who has worked in a service job knows that you have the odd bad moment, the odd bad day. Some times dealing with the general public can wear you down. Does that justify personal abuse? Absolutely not.
But we are all human. And I think as commentators and observers we should be a little slower to publically crucify someone. And from an internal communciations perspective you have to ask yourself whether the mayor’s comments (via twitter) have actually helped to improve employee morale, and indeed customer service, overall at TfL? Or have they in fact undermined it?
We’d certainly be interested in your views on this. We’re planning to hold a debate-style event around the impact of digital media on employees and consumers. It will be on the evening of 25th November here in Soho Square. If you’d like to come along do let me know.
Okay it’s been a while since I’ve blogged. Sorry about that. But hopefully I can explain why.
Yes it’s been hectic. I’ve been on holiday to Canada. Then I was in Oslo, then Amsterdam. There have been pitches and new business wins. And of course the day job of working with our wonderful existing clients (you know who you are).
So you might be expecting me to talk about some of that.
But my focus is on different kind of engagement. Because you see I’m getting married.
It may not be earth shattering news (it wasn’t for my folks) as I already have a mortgage and an 8 month old baby with Sarah. As well as 10 years together. But hey, I’m excited about it.
We now have the whole wedding planning to sort out. Which from the intial conversations I’ve had is a whole hornets nest waiting to be stirred up.
As I write this I am sitting on my mum and dad’s deck overlooking the wonderful Lake Okanagan. Little Erin is sitting - well fidgeting - on my knee actually.
I am so glad to be here. I didn’t think the first day of my holiday would ever arrive. A hectic last few days at work, a trip out of town for a christening and then a 16 hour journey half way across the world…
The last few months have been incredibly busy from both a work and personal perspective. And of course little Erin’s arrival has shaken up our world.
I have also seen my two closest friends get married this year. It has been a privilege to play a role in their special days (as well as helping them prepare for married life on their stag dos!). And then I was fortunate enough to be asked to be godparent to Simon and Ceri’s twins last Sunday.
As I mentioned in my very first blog it is an honour to be asked to play so many important roles. But it’s also pretty exhausting.
Work has also been interesting. We are definitely seeing signs that the market is picking up. We are certainly being asked to pitch for lots of new business.
So I had pangs of guilt leaving Hanna to handle a big pitch next week, and knowing Laura is working diligently through a tough client workload (even while on her notice period).
But frankly I know I need a break. I’ll be back firing on all cylinders in a little over two weeks.
