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By Stephen J. Cabot, Esq.
Opening channels of communication between management and employees is the single most important step to reducing the threat of labor problems. While the importance of open communications is well understood and sounds simple, few companies effectively implement a strategic communications action plan. The result is that employees feel alienated and they continue to perceive management as insular and secretive—which ultimately takes its toll on the bottom line.
It is essential that open communications be ongoing, not something that one initiates in the face of a potential labor problem. Too often, management waits until a problem arises before opening the doors of communication. Faced with negotiating a new union contract or even dealing with a union organizing effort, management may suddenly decide it's time to talk with their workers. By then it may be too late. Workers will naturally suspect management's motives and regard everything its says with cynical disbelief.
There are many ways management can demonstrate concern for and good will toward employees, and each is a necessary tactic within the overall strategic action plan:
- Establish a simple benefit program that provides small, short-term, interest-free loans in case of emergencies.
- Send anniversary and birthday cards to employees and pay for dinners for employees and their spouses on special occasions.
- Provide a financial expert to offer free financial advice about retirement investments.
- Offer fitness and stress-reduction classes at a nominal charge.
- Provide a guidance counselor to offer advice about college admissions and costs.
- Consider additional practices, such as funeral leave-taking without losing pay, company picnics, sporting events, dances, talent shows, dinners, fashion shows and fitness classes.
All events should be open to spouses and children so that they, too, develop positive attitudes toward management. Altogether, such tactics should be used to make employees feel as if they are stakeholders in the company.
Once management has demonstrated its ongoing concern for the welfare of its employees, it can open more direct channels of communication, knowing that its credibility is secure. There are numerous kinds of meetings that permit management to interact candidly with all levels of employees:
- Group meetings provide management with an effective opportunity to communicate its concerns to its employees, while also providing employees with opportunities to voice their concerns. The meetings can occur bi-annually, quarterly or even monthly. At such meetings, management can explain what it is doing and why. It can answer workers' questions, thus diminishing the opportunities for misunderstandings that, could eventually grow into major labor relations problems. Group meetings must be interactive and open to discussion of a wide range of problems, not just the business concerns of management. These meetings must be regularly scheduled and treated as an important and integral part of the communications action plan. Again, too often, companies call such meetings only when they have problems.
- Quality circles permit management to tackle problems of workplace efficiency through a one-on-one give and take. Together, management and employees examine productivity and determine actions for improvement. For employees, such meetings result in a sense of having had an active role in formulating company policy—to feel like a stakeholder.
- Updates are meetings that are held on a monthly basis, to cover company policy, sales, earnings, expansions, etc. These meetings occur during the workday and employees are paid for their time. Defused negative rumors, revised production methods and increased understanding of new company policies are just some of the positive results of such meetings.
In addition to meetings, there should be written means for communicating with employees. Among those forms of communications are newsletters, personalized letters, private memos, and public notices.
Newsletters should be mailed to each employee's home. Employees will read about company programs and family members will learn more about the company, building a positive view of the firm. Another effective written communication is the personalized letter mailed to individual employees' homes, thanking them for their help. Similarly, management can place important reminders, notes of appreciation and the accomplishment of goals in memos into employees' pay envelopes.
A physical bulletin board provides an opportunity to reach all employees with important announcements. The board should be placed where all employees can view it. Notices about company policies, work rules, jobs and requirements can be posted, supplementing the corporate intranet.
The final element in a strategic communications action plan is the exit interview. It provides management with one of its best opportunities to gain candid appraisals about the company from departing employees. When an employee leaves, he or she may candidly voice concerns, opinions and advice, permitting management to learn a great deal about problems that an employee may have been hesitant to express while employed. This information can identify ways to improve working conditions, make positive changes in corporate culture and increase levels of trust and credibility.
All of the above strategies are necessary ingredients for an effective strategic communications action plan. It is only when management and employees talk and listen to one another, discussing issues of immediate concern, that both sides are on the road to agreement. Without open communication, companies feed adversarial relationships that lead to unions where none had existed and to slowdowns, walkouts and strikes where unions are already in place. The unfortunate end result will be a decreasing bottom line.
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Author Bio: Stephen J. Cabot, a nationally renowned management-labor lawyer, is the co-chairman of the Labor Relations and Employment Law Department of Saul Ewing, LLP. His e-mail address is scabot@saul.com.
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