Storybook #2
At Wimwan Sandwichery corporate office, you receive an email from some of the higher-ups about downsizing. The e-mail explains that the downsizing will not be widespread – they’re just hoping to trim a few departments that grew really fast when the company was expanding, but now need to be more efficient as the company becomes more profitable. You find out that your team won’t be directly affected from team managers meetings. How would you handle this situation and deliver message to your team?
A communication is a key to gain trust of employees. So for this situation, a manager must hold a formal staff meeting with team members and explain the situation and provide information as “The Company’s looking to be more profitable and will downsize about 100 people but it will not affect our group. Our group is helping company be profitable. You don’t need to worry about layoff. This information is confidential, please don’t share with anyone. If you have any concern regarding this situation/or other situation you can come to my office any time as you know I have open office policy.” At this time, keeping morale up becomes very important. Thus, downward face-to-face communication will help keep team member to be positive about his/her work and keep morale up. One study found employees were twice as likely to be committed to changes when the reasons behind them were fully explained (Stephen & Timothy, 2013). The other reason, to hold staff meeting, is that employee can see manager facial expression, confidence and humbleness. This type of situation should not be communicated through email because of several reasons; Not everyone reads every email, some people may not read complete email and may misinterpreting the message, some people may forward to other people and create chaos, and manager can not see facial expression of an employee – this is important to determine whether or not more communication/counseling is needed.
The manager can not eliminate the gossip but can contain and limits the impact on his team by holding team meeting, providing proper informational, explain the entire situation calmly and rationally and reiterating company’s mission and plan, and always have open communication