How HR Leads in Communicating Through Challenges

Every company, at some point, will experience a challenge that impacts individuals at all levels of the organization. Hopefully these challenges are few and far between, but they can be thought of as a part of being in business. So if your organization is currently facing a challenge, you're not alone. It's not about whether or not you face challenges, it's really about how you respond and communicate through those challenges and how that communication ultimately impacts your team. HR plays a very big role in making those communications as streamlined and sound as possible, all with a focus on balancing the needs of the company with the needs of employees.

Planning Process

The first thing to realize is that you need a plan. You have to strategize around what the problem is, how it impacts the team, what legal parameters may exist and how you can best provide your team with the information you are able to provide to them. This means a cross functional group of leaders should come together to discuss impact, timing and sentiment before a strategic communication is developed.

Timing and Forum Decisions

Once you're clear on what you want to communicate, it's time to make decisions on when communications will be made and how communication will be shared. Will you hold an all staff meeting? Will managers lead small group sessions with their teams? One-on-one meetings? How you move forward depends on the circumstances, but should be understood as a part of your planning process. If communication will be shared verbally, it's important to think about crafting written copy to summarize meeting topics. You'll also want to decide who will send any written communication.

Follow Up Questions

If you're in this situation, it's likely that those you are communicating with feel a direct and  acute impact from the circumstances. Questions will arise. How are you going to deal with those questions? HR should be available as needed to respond to questions. And leadership / managers should be prepped with talking points to navigate difficult conversations that may come from their teams.

Everything goes back to the initial planning. If you properly plan you can avoid some of the negative impact that could result from skipping those steps. Leadership sets the example, and if leadership is prepared, it means a better outcome from others across the organization.

So how does HR help facilitate this process?

HR should really drive the process and should come to the table with the baseline compliance parameters to ensure that anything said or any actions taken don't cross any boundaries. Legal, either in-house or through outside consult should have a word in on this as well. From there HR can help ensure that company culture is infused into each part of the process. Having an understanding of past survey data or other informal metrics that may inform the knowledge of current engagement within the company.

Is the process easy? No! But is it worth it. 100%.