This morning, reading through my various email newsletters, I came across some … I won’t say shocking, because I’m neither surprised nor shocked; I’ll say concerning data in FAST COMPANY magazine’s “Compass” newsletter.
They cited a McKinsey survey that indicates that
…two thirds of full-time corporate or government employees surveyed said that their employers haven’t shared a detailed post-pandemic strategy.“Our recent research found that this failure to communicate clearly is hurting morale, culture, and retention,” write University of Massachusetts Lowell professors Kimberly Merriman, David Greenway, and Tamara Montag-Smit.
This is a problem.
Maybe you haven’t set your strategy yet. Okay, you’re running a tad (!) late on that, and you can still communicate. In fact, if this is your situation, now would be a great time to gather information from your people about what they want, so you can include that in your planning.
Maybe you have a plan, but you’re busy with All The Things, so you haven’t told your people yet. Yes, it’s hard to stay on top of All The Things when All The Things are changing so fast. And you can still communicate.
Maybe you firmly believe you have communicated the plan. Great! That’s excellent. You might want to check in with your people, though, and see if they feel like they know what to expect. Just because one person says something doesn’t mean their audience actually hears and understands.
Leaders: What are your return-to-work post-pandemic plans for your people? McKinsey survey says 2/3 of employees don't know. That's...not good. Communicate, please!Click To TweetAnd if you’re not one of the ones making the plans and setting the strategy, you can still communicate. In this case, though, try communicating up the chain and letting your leaders know that there’s some uncertainty and confusion for them to address.
If people don’t know what to expect, they’ll lose trust and become skeptical and cynical. And given the current job market, they just might find another employer who’s doing more to … yes … communicate expectations.
Losing employees is expensive. How expensive is it? Click for an easy-to-use calculation spreadsheet!