Itâs the human resources dilemma: how to balance whatâs best for the business with whatâs best for employees.
The place where you feel it the most? Medical benefit costs. With health care costs increasing nationally, HR is stuck in the middle trying to decide between savings for the company and easing the cost burden on employees.
Finding new strategies to lower costs is a constant challenge â one that doesnât always prove fruitful. Employers that tried 14 or more tactics to curb rising health benefit costs, such as having healthy food choices available or offering onsite fitness facilities, only realized .4 percent savings, according to a recent Mercer survey. Thatâs a lot of work for little payoff.
Barry Rose, superintendent of Cumberland School District in Wisconsin, cycled through numerous health plans in the last six years, none of which struck the right balance between saving the district money and satisfying employees. âI couldnât keep taking money out of the budget to spend on health insurance. Our district needs that $2 million for a new high school and teacher salaries.â
One hidden culprit behind the health benefits struggle? High-deductible health plans. Todayâs average deductible is $3,000. Yet, many Americans donât have $400 in savings to cover medical costs.
Deductibles often are preventing people from seeking the care they need. Due to cost, 44 percent of Americans say they avoided the doctor last year when they were sick or injured. In addition to lower company morale, care avoidance is costing businesses a lot of money. Illness-related productivity losses cost employers $530 billion on top of the $880 billion they spent on health benefits in 2018.
When J&E Manufacturing Co., a custom metal manufacturing company in the Midwest, learned from their existing health insurance provider their premiums were set to balloon over 30 percent in 2019 along with a deductible of $6,500, Ha Nguyen, corporate human resources manager, took a hard look at alternatives for their 200 employees.
âI couldnât stand before our employees and tell them that,â said Nguyen, âIt would upset most people, and we would risk some of them deciding to explore the marketplace to find a different job. Manufacturing is in a talent shortage right now, so we canât afford to lose employees.â
With unemployment at an all-time low, itâs a candidateâs market; they have negotiating leverage and little tolerance for inferior benefits. Recruiters are struggling to offer attractive new incentives â commuter reimbursement, stock options, and personal trainers. Between the 14 tactics to lower costs and the myriad efforts to attract and retain talent, human resource professionals are juggling a lot.
HR managers need solutions that lower everyoneâs health care costs and also promote compelling talent acquisition and retention. How can they do that? By giving employees what they want:
Clarity on what care is covered.
Clarity on the exact cost for that care.
Employees want access to both those things before they obtain care, not weeks after. When employees have access to these things in their health insurance plan, it can drive down costs for the employer.
Both J&E and Cumberland found such a solution in on-demand health insurance, a new model of health insurance that gives employees more control. Instead of a deductible and unpredictable costs, they have simple copays, easy coverage verification, and price certainty before they step foot into a doctorâs office.
âOur employees became better consumers because they see exactly what theyâre paying for care,â Rose said. Seventy percent of members on the plan spent less than $500 in total copays â thatâs one-sixth the cost of the average deductible.
And they have a compelling new advantage to attract talent.
âTop tier labor is hard to find. When people look at our benefits package and compare it to others, they see our plan is superior,â said Nguyen. âIn the past, I just glossed over the health insurance plan during interviews. Now, itâs one of the first things I mention.â
Take some time to evaluate your current health insurance offering. Are you feeling like you are trapped between your employees and your C-suite? You donât have to be. Itâs time to make health care easy and affordable, and itâs time to empower your employees to make informed care choices.
Road maps are a form of content that will help you navigate key areas of people management. Each road map includes an orientation guide that gives a high-level overview of the subject as well as articles and other resources that provide more detailed directions on how to find your way to success. This road map focuses on the changing terrain of employee communication. The orientation guide below will get you started, and we invite you to see other Workforce road maps by visiting workforce.com/roadmaps.
Effective employee communication is the foundation of a good human resources program. Setting guidelines for how and when to communicate with employees, and what you are going to say sets the tone for the company culture and paves the way for business success. However, most companies â even big global firms â often leave this important element of human resource management to chance.
Only 20 percent of organizations have an internal communications role somewhere within their HR department, according to a 2018 Newsweaver study. In other organizations this role falls to sales and marketing teams, individual managers or no one in particular.
âThey just let the communication culture emerge, and assume everyone knows what to do,â said Craig Johnson, partner in Mercerâs Career Business focusing on communication and technology. âThatâs not the right approach.â
This âdo-it-yourselfâ attitude leads to mixed messages, missed opportunities to engage, and a negative communication experience when employees are deluged with messages from management that they eventually just tune out, according to Rachel Miller, director of All Things IC, an internal communications consultancy.
âInternal communications should be part of your business strategy and plan,â she said. It ensures that internal messaging is consistent, relevant to the brand, and reflective of the company culture and business goals. âEvery message should reflect what the company is trying to achieve.â
If you donât have a communication plan â or havenât reviewed yours in years â this road map will help you get started.
PART 1: Make a Plan
Put someone in charge. A communication strategy needs a leader, said Johnson. Putting someone from HR in change of the overarching company communication plan ensures a consistent tone and prevents disparate, confusing or conflicting information bombarding employees from all sides.
Identify stakeholders. Effective employee communication requires planning and buy-in from leaders across the organization. Miller suggests bringing together a cross functional team of executives, HR leaders, managers and employees to write the plan and ensure it aligns with the corporate vision.
Define your goals. A good communication plan links communication strategies to the purpose of the company, its mission and its vision. âDonât just copy the words off a vision statement,â Miller warned. Really think about what the company is trying to do and how internal communication supports those goals.
Consider your audience. Itâs not enough to know what information you want to send, you need to customize it for the reader. If you are announcing a merger, the information you share with front-line workers or IT teams will be far different from the messages you send to VPs and managers. âUnderstanding your audience is how you get the right information to the right people at the right time so that they can do their jobs,â Miller said.
Choose your channels. Do your employees read emails every day? Visit the company portal? Communicate via Slack? âItâs easy to attach a document to an email, but if three-fourths of your employees wonât click on it, what is the point?â Johnson said. Understanding how, where and when employees want to engage with company content will increase the chance that your messages will get read.
Create a calendar. Large companies may have dozens of vendors sending information to employees about benefits packages, 401(k) plans, insurance offerings, etc. If they all send messages at the same time it creates a tremendous amount of noise, Johnson said. To reduce the deluge, he advises clients to audit all communications â including vendor messages â then eliminate the ones that arenât necessary, and create a schedule for those that are. âA plan helps you think through what you are sending instead of always reacting.â
He suggests organizing messages into three categories:
Annual events: Messages related to benefits enrollment and updates about annual meetings can be scheduled months in advance.
Ad hoc scheduled events. These include one-time scheduled events, including information about workshops, announcement about technology upgrades or reminders to complete required training.
Ad hoc unplanned events. Leave some space in the calendar for urgent messages that canât wait.
Remember, Johnson added, âeven if emails from vendors are part of the service, if the message isnât useful it wonât add value.â
PART 2: Start Communicating
Customize each message. Every communication should begin with an overarching message about why this information ties back to the companyâs goals and values, Johnson said. For example, if you are hosting a financial wellness workshop, start the announcement with, âAs part of our commitment to helping employees achieve a better work-life balance, we are offering this financial wellness workshop to ⌠.â â
It shows that the workshop is tied to something broader, Johnson said.
Create a review step. Having someone else review messages before they get sent to the entire company can minimize the risk that grammar errors, inaccurate information and embarrassing gaffes get sent out.
Provide training. HR isnât the only group sending company communiques. To ensure there is a consistent cadence in all internal messages, provide training to managers and leaders about how to craft messages that align with the business goals.
PART 3: Measure Results
Define success. Every communication campaign should have a goal. âThat is what makes measurement possible,â Miller said.
Establish key performance indicators. When setting measures, focus on outcomes not output. Counting messages sent or number of people who signed up for a class doesnât tell you much, Miller said, whereas tracking the results of these programs will. Some useful measures might include proof of changed behavior, improved employee engagement, increased participation in rewards programs or fewer safety incidences. âOutcomes are tangible if you know what you are looking for,â she added. âWe donât do this enough.â
Ask employees what they think. Include questions in employee surveys about the quality of company communication, their top communication issues and/or what could be done better. This can provide evidence of the impact of HR communication efforts and help identify areas that require improvement.
Adapt accordingly. A communication plan is always evolving. Measuring outcomes can help you identify which messages, channels and cadence of content is having the biggest impact, so you can continue to adjust it to meet employeesâ needs.
Assuming Stanâs correct, and more people are becoming more comfortable openly using this generally considered highly offensive and taboo word, how should you react if your employees start using it among each other? Swiftly and decisively, thatâs how.
Consider Reeves v. C.H. Robinson Worldwide, which decided the issue of whether vulgar language to which all employees (male and female) are equally exposed is actionable as sexual harassment.
The court made a clear distinction between general, gender-nonspecific swear words, such as shit and fuck, (maybe improper, but not necessarily unlawful) as compared to gender-specific epithets such as bitch, whore, and the granddaddy of them all, cunt (unlawful harassment).
[T]he context may illuminate whether the use of an extremely vulgar, gender-neutral term such as âfuckingâ would contribute to a hostile work environment. âFuckingâ can be used as an intensifying adjective before gender-specific epithets such as âbitch.â In that context, âfuckingâ is used to strengthen the attack on women, and is therefore relevant to the Title VII analysis. However, the obscene word does not itself afford a gender-specific meaning. Thus, when used in context without reference to gender, âfuckâ and âfuckingâ fall more aptly under the rubric of general vulgarity that Title VII does not regulate. âŚ
[W]ords and conduct that are sufficiently gender-specific and either severe or pervasive may state a claim of a hostile work environment, even if the words are not directed specifically at the plaintiff. ⌠It is enough to hear co-workers on a daily basis refer to female colleagues as ⌠âcunts,â to understand that they view women negatively, and in a humiliating or degrading way. The harasser need not close the circle with reference to the plaintiff specifically: âand you are a âbitch,â too.â âŚ
âCunt,â referring to a womanâs vagina, is the essence of a gender-specific slur. âŚ
The social context at C.H. Robinson detailed by Reeves allows for the inference to be drawn that the abuse did not amount to simple teasing, offhand comments, or isolated incidents, but rather constituted repeated and intentional discrimination directed at women as a group, if not at Reeves specifically. It is not fatal to her claim that Reevesâs co-workers never directly called her a âbitch,â a âfucking whore,â or a âcunt.â Reeves claims that the offensive conduct occurred âevery single day,â and that the manager âaccepted and tolerated that same behaviorâ over her repeated complaints. If C.H. Robinson tolerated this environment, it may be found to have adopted âthe offending conduct and its results,â just as if the employer affirmatively authorized it.
Thus, while general vulgarities are not typically actionable as harassment, severe or pervasive gender-specific words or phrases are actionable even if the words are not specifically directed at one employee, but are merely generally used in the workplace. The aforementioned âc-wordâ is the perfect example.
The takeaway for employers? Words are sometimes not just words, and businesses should respond to complaints about coarse or vulgar language as they would to any other complaint of harassment. An employer cannot just assume that words are harmless and ignore the complaint. And if you do, youâre just being a ⌠.
For managers who are building or inheriting teams in todayâs fast-paced, digitally enabled business environment, things are far more interesting, productive and creative. But that doesnât simplify managing a modern global team.
Most enterprise companies now do business overseas, and they employ teams that span many boundaries: cultural, functional, geographic and global teams are becoming more of the norm. According to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, worldwide employment by U.S. multinational enterprises increased 0.4 percent from 42.1 million in 2015 to 42.3 million workers in 2016 (the latest year available).
The good news is that people typically enjoy working on global teams. Based on data from a 2019 âGlobal Employee Surveyâ conducted by my company, professional employer organization Globalization Partners, 72 percent of people said they like to be part of global teams but like them even more when they feel listened to and treated fairly. Also, the flexibility in work locations lets companies hire the best talent anywhere in the world, and the diversity that comes from global teams can be a huge benefit.
But there are challenges that generally fall into three types: communications, logistics and culture. Communication issues are no surprise, but if not tended to can snowball to become serious problems. Also, the same diversity that brings new ideas into the mix and inspires us can cause conflict and disagreement, or misunderstandings and hurt feelings.
What does it take to succeed in managing a global team? It rolls up to two kinds of activities: establishing good systems and establishing trust.
Establishing good systems means following the laws and knowing the customs in the places where your organization does business, taking the time to understand how your team will need to work together and then acquiring the technology to support it. It also means communicating with your team â in a firm, clear and inclusive way â to help them adhere to those systems and use those tools. Here are some best practices.
Understand the law. Work with finance, legal and HR teams to be sure you are always operating according to local laws.
Set up centralized information sharing. Make sure your team can all access the same files and tools, and establish centralized, cloud-based sharing to save yourself endless headaches and revision nightmares.
Establish strong communications methods. Choose your tech wisely and stick to it. Plan for differences in schedules and augment text-based communication (email, instant message, text) with face-to-face meetings whenever possible using online video tools. Difficulty with languages or accents? Try more text-based collaboration.
Rotate time zones fairly. Introduce your team to tools like world clocks, which tell you what time it is anywhere in the world. When scheduling meetings be sure not to eat up all your âgolden hour overlapâ time when everyone is available with meetings, leaving no time for spontaneous collaboration. Also, be aware and respectful of holidays, which of course differ from region to region.
Encourage participation and communication. Make sure the processes and tools you put into place encourage people from all backgrounds to have a voice in the conversation. People who connect daily with global team members feel more connected, engaged and involved than those who donât.
Itâs a lot easier to build processes than trust, but you will need both to be successful. In terms of establishing trust, global virtual managers donât get the benefits of managing by walking around that local managers get, so youâll have to make up for it in other ways. Here are a few.
Do your culture homework. The very act of expressing genuine interest in an individual and their background improves morale and understanding. According to our survey data, more than two-thirds of employees (68 percent) say their companies struggle at least some of the time to align with, be sensitive about and adhere to local laws, practices and cultures.
Understand working styles and communications. In addition to understanding cultures, get to know your employees as individuals. Be sensitive to how people from a âdominantâ culture within the team may frustrate team members from a region that is less represented or that has differing cultural norms and values.
Set goals, communicate, motivate and inspire: This is Manager 101, but with all the unique challenges of managing a dispersed team it can fall by the wayside. Be sure youâre working with those team members, not just on deliverables but also on their development.
Know your tech. Be willing to tailor your communication style and medium to the needs of different employees, based on things like time zones and language barriers.
Be available. The most successful managers make themselves available across multiple time zones and through different means of technology (IM, Slack, Skype, email, phone and text).
Check in frequently and consistently. Global team members who connect daily with their co-workers feel more engaged and involved than those who donât. Employees who feel like they belong are 93 percent more likely to say they feel optimistic about their companyâsâ future.
 As more companies continue to enter the global game, they will need to make it a priority to build and nurture a local team, set them up with compliant, equitable systems, demonstrate an understanding of local culture, and establish communications practices that make them feel valued and heard. If not, they risk losing the much sought-after international employees that can be so hard to find.
Relationships are complex, particularly so at work since employees have limited control over who they interact with.
While thereâs no shortage of advice on how to deal with matters of the heart, working relationships are rarely discussed until it becomes painfully obvious theyâre not working. In the wake of the #MeToo movement there has been an increasing focus on fostering more respectful workplace environments.
Yet most managers receive little guidance when it comes to building, maintaining and repairing healthy relationships that often foster toxic workplaces. In many instances they evolve into one of three types of supervisor: the buddy, the boss or the bully.
In a study of what makes a manager effective, the quality of their relationships was found to make the biggest difference to their success. Understand how to do relationships well and everything else becomes easier. Feedback is better received, delegation of duties becomes more straightforward and employees find it easier to cope with change.
Individuals who report good relationships with their managers are healthier, happier and have more fulfilling careers. They perform better, put in more discretionary effort, are more innovative, more resilient and more likely to stay with the organization.
Relationships between team colleagues are also critical. For example, in a study of hospital wards in England, teams who worked well together saw a 3.3 percent drop in mortality rates, the equivalent to saving 40 lives per year.
Destructive relationships wreak havoc for individuals and for organizations. Studies show that for three-quarters of employees, the most stressful part of their job is their boss. A 2015 Gallup survey revealed that half of respondents claimed to have left their most recent job due to a poor relationship with their boss.
As well as the human costs, the financial repercussions of toxic workplace behavior can reach the millions. Considering that managers account for 70 percent of the variance in employee engagement, the disengagement caused by bad bosses costs businesses upward of a half-billion dollars annually.
While this is not a new trend (with research dating back to the 1990s showing âjob stressâ related to poor management being cited in 75 percent of workersâ compensation claims) the need to address it has become more pressing in the age of #MeToo.
The Buddy, the Boss and the Bully
Psychologists in 2007 identified a âtoxic triangleâ of factors that foster negative relationships between leaders and followers. The combination of dysfunctional leaders, silent subjects and a permissive environment create a situation where relationships are likely to break down in a detrimental way.
Dysfunctional leaders. Most people have a dark side that comes out, particularly during times of pressure. Without clear guidance on managing the more complex aspects of workersâ personalities, managers often revert to behavioral patterns developed in childhood.
In 1950, psychologist Karen Horney published important research that outlined three patterns of coping behavior that children rely upon in times of stress. Some naturally turn toward people, seeking out closeness in order to feel comforted. Others turn away, preferring to cope independently. The third group actively turn against other people, choosing to fight.
Adults draw on a combination of these coping mechanisms but usually have a preference for one over the other. When taken to its extreme, this preference becomes dysfunctional and can result in some bad behavior.
First, we have the manager who prefers to turn toward others. These leaders want to be everybodyâs friend, seeking approval in order to validate themselves. The manager morphs into the Buddy.
On its face this might seem OK, but this type of relationship can go horribly wrong. Amy Gallo, author of the âHBR Guide to Dealing with Conflict,â warns that these managers can shy away from giving feedback, avoid going to bat for their teams and give in too easily to demands. Their need for approval can create an overly politicized, clique-y organization where personal boundaries are frequently abused.
Then there is the âturn awayâ manager who doesnât care what other people think of them so long as the job gets done. They are the stereotypical detached Boss, interested in delivering to deadline at the expense of everything else. They have no interest in building healthy relationships, believe in reinforcing hierarchy and donât care if they are overburdening people. This focus on results at the expense of relationships means teams are less loyal, less happy and ultimately less likely to give it their all.
The âturn againstâ manager arguably takes the crown as the worst supervisor. They care about relationships but only so they can twist and manipulate them for their own gain. They are the quintessential Bully. They love relationships for the opportunities they give them to take advantage and get what they want.
Bullying and harassment in the workplace are more common than youâd think; considering that three-quarters of employees report that theyâve experienced it at some point in their career. And the worrying reality is that weâre all at risk of straying into these toxic personas from time to time; itâs not just the extreme characters that cause havoc. As people gain more power in their careers, the skills they need to be successful, such as empathy and collaboration, tend to be less important, and so a vicious cycle ensues.
Silent Subjects. For dysfunctional leaders to flourish to the extent that relationships break down irreparably, they need followers who for a variety of reasons avoid speaking out. This can mean conformers â those who are typically obedient to authority, prone to group-think, donât feel that itâs safe to speak up or are unwilling to challenge the status quo. Sometimes people donât even know the behaviors to look out for or what to do when they see it.
It can also be in the form of colluders who see benefit in aligning themselves with a destructive leader. Colluders reinforce the leaderâs bad behavior, repress any would-be whistleblowers and help the toxic cycle continue.
Permissive Environment. A permissive workplace environment is one that permits or may even encourage bad relationships to flourish. If the culture is overly politicized and consensus is valued above all else, the inner Buddy will come to the fore. If itâs a results-driven environment in which targets must be met at all costs, the Boss is likely to emerge. And in a dog-eat-dog culture where aggression and intimidation are par for the course the Bully will come to the fore.These are all extremes, of course, but every companyâs policies and processes as well as the culture, values and norms will nudge its leaders to behave in a certain way.
There are methods to limit the buddy-boss-bully syndrome and create a workplace atmosphere more conducive to building strong manager-report relationships. Here are five focus areas for making a difference to building a culture of good working relationships.
Limit the abuse of power. As an executive, encourage self-awareness and introspection in leaders. The right balance is being respectful of boundaries while also providing descriptive feedback, precision coaching and stretching but not straining targets. Organizations should consider the strategies they use to select their leaders. Is enough being done to weed out the bad apples or are there entrenched, bias-laden approaches that toxic leaders can take advantage of? Organizations might be better off hiring decent leaders than hyper-talented individuals with an uncontrollable dark side.
Establish norms and boundaries. Working relationships work best when managers strike the right balance. Overly focusing on the relationship could allow for goals to slip out of reach. Ignore your teamâs needs though, and commitment to work could falter. Managers need to set standards for their team by role-modeling respectful, inclusionary behavior and being clear on the behaviors that are appropriate and the boundaries that shouldnât be crossed. This applies in every interaction, from giving feedback and dealing with poor performance to inquiring about a team memberâs well-being and sharing personal details.
Contract from the start. In every manager-report relationship there exists a psychological contract about how each should behave, although these rules usually remain unspoken. Managers should be encouraged to have a frank conversation with their reports about what each side expects from the relationship, where you draw the line and any behavioral nonnegotiables. Making these assumptions explicit means thereâll be no room for misunderstanding, and avoids relationship breaking down.
Give permission and voice. The first challenge is helping people see the toxic behavior for what it is. The second is helping them to understand that thereâs nothing wrong with calling out disrespectful behavior in a professional way. With many people, their self-identity can get in the way as there is a dissonance between how people see themselves (successful, confident) and not wanting to appear as the victim.
Repair ruptures. Despite our best efforts, relationships will go awry. When that happens, refer to a quick, effective repair kit. This comes in four stages:
⢠Pause. Step back from the heat of the moment and do whatever needs to be done in order to emotionally reset.
⢠Contain. Address the conflict in the moment and keep it isolated to that specific incident to prevent toxicity from seeping into the relationship as a whole.
⢠Play back. Share thoughts and feelings and be open to hearing what others are saying. Play back whatâs been said so they feel listened to.
⢠Reassure. Remind yourself and the other person that conflict is inevitable, and if handled well can strengthen the relationship in the long run.
Nobody said it would be easy but given the impact of relationships on almost every measure of workplace success, it pays to understand how to make our working relationships work.
A group led by Australian technology entrepreneur Tasmin Trezise acquired Chicago-based Human Capital Media, the parent company of business-to-business publications Workforce, Chief Learning Officer and Talent Economy.
Trezise, 26, is the co-owner of Brisbane, Australia-based Tanda, a 7-year-old technology firm that produces time and attendance, scheduling and labor-compliance software.
âI look forward to working with the team as we continue to uphold the dignity, research and empowerment of the working man and woman,â Trezise said.
The Human Capital Media entities will operate separately from Tanda with a shared ownership, said Trezise, who will be president of Workforce, a multimedia publication that covers the intersection of people management and business strategy. Kevin Simpson will remain president of all other Human Capital Media properties, Trezise said.
âThis is about serving the Workforce mission of bringing together HR, learning, engineering, research and stakeholders in the success of working people and I put the call out for them to join us,â Trezise said. âThe vision is to deliver on my promise to resurrect the Workforce history and continue its rightful position as the ultimate source for how the way we work is changing.â
He pointed to the long history of Workforce as inspiration for its planned future. The publicationâs history dates back to 1922 with the founding principles laid out by James R. Angell, former president of Yale University, Carnegie Corp. and the National Research Council, to coordinate the efforts of over 250 scientific, engineering, labor, management and educational bodies. Trezise aims to shape Workforce into the clearinghouse for the most advanced thinking and solutions on the future of work; Â and how to improve the happiness, welfare and efficiency of workers.
âI want to bring my background and experience to carry on the mission that was first formulated in 1922,â he said. âThis means reuniting all engineering and technological bodies with critical research to help people leaders better connect and pursue the application of this knowledge for the benefit of their teams.â
Founded in 1999, Human Capital Media is an integrated information services and market intelligence company whose brands include Human Capital Media Research and Advisory Services, and Chief Learning Officer and Workforce magazines. Terms of the private deal, which closed April 30, were not disclosed.
Workplace harassment isnât illegal unless it is harassment because of some protected characteristic (sex, race, age, religion, national origin, disability, or any other class protected by law).
Generalized workplace bullying or other mistreatment is not illegal unless it falls into one of those categories. Indeed, as the Supreme Court has repeatedly reminded us, workplace discrimination laws are not âa general civility code.â
Just because the federal workplace discrimination laws are not âgeneral civility codesâ does not mean that individual states canât do more with their own laws.
For example, consider Tennesseeâs Healthy Workplace Act. It encourages anti-bullying and respectful workplace policies by granting immunity to an employer from lawsuits alleging negligent or intentional infliction of emotional distress if that employer adopts such a policy. Tennessee even provides a Model Abusive Conduct Prevention Policy [pdf].
As originally drafted, Tennesseeâs law only applied to public employers. Last week, Tennessee amended it to apply to all employers in that state.
Bravo to Tennessee for taking a stand against abusive bosses and other bullies at work. But also, how sad that we need a law to tell employees to treat each other like, well, like people.
The [Insert Entity Name] is firmly committed to a workplace free from abusive conduct as defined herein. We strive to provide high quality products and services in an atmosphere of respect, collaboration, openness, safety and equality. All employees have the right to be treated with dignity and respect.
The policy prohibits employees from:
Repeated verbal abuse in the workplace, including derogatory remarks, insults, and epithets;
Verbal, nonverbal, or physical conduct of a threatening, intimidating, or humiliating nature in the workplace; or
The sabotage or undermining of an employeeâs work performance in the workplace.
And it requires supervisors to:
Provide a working environment as safe as possible by having preventative measures in place and by dealing immediately with threatening or potentially violent situations;
Provide good examples by treating all with courtesy and respect;
Ensure that all employees have access to and are aware of the abusive conduct prevention policy and explain the procedures to be followed if a complaint of inappropriate behavior at work is made;
Be vigilant for signs of inappropriate behaviors at work through observation and information seeking, and take action to resolve the behavior before it escalates; and
Respond promptly, sensitively and confidentially to all situations where abusive behavior is observed or alleged to have occurred.
Such admirable goals. Itâs just so sad that we need to legislate them into existence.
So hereâs my version of the Healthy Workplace Act (and sorry for the language, but I figure weâre all adults here):
Congress shall make no law ⌠abridging the freedom of speechâŚ.
So reads the 1st Amendment of the Constitution.
Take note that it does not say, âYou have absolute freedom of speech in all things at all times.â It only prohibits government-imposed restrictions on speech.
I am continuing to monitor the censorship of AMERICAN CITIZENS on social media platforms. This is the United States of America â and we have whatâs known as FREEDOM OF SPEECH! We are monitoring and watching, closely!!
I promise you that if the president of the United States does not understand how the 1st Amendment works, your employees donât understand it, either.
Indeed, according to one recent survey, only 28 percent of American workers understand that getting fired because of a social media post does not violate their 1st Amendment free speech rights. Clearly, employees do not have free speech rights at work.
There are four key exceptions to this rule.
Public-sector employees. Government employees are the only employees the 1st Amendment actually protects. Still, their free speech rights are not absolute. The 1st Amendment only protects them as private citizens speaking on matters of public concern, and only then if the employeeâs interest in speaking freely outweighs government employerâs interest in efficiently fulfilling its public services.
Protected concerted activity under the National Labor Relations Act. Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act protects the right of employees to, between and among themselves, discuss wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment. While the Board has attempted to narrow these protections over the past year, their scope is still fairly broad, even extending to obscene pro-union rants and racist picket-line threats.
Protected activity under anti-discrimination laws. If an employeeâs speech is in complaint about unlawful discrimination or harassment, various anti-retaliation provisions protect their speech from retaliation.
Specific state laws that either protect employee speech or other lawful off-duty conduct. Several states have specific laws that protect an employeeâs political speech, or, more broadly, speech in general. Even more states protect an employeeâs right to engage in lawful off-duty conduct. Ohio has neither. Regardless check your state laws if you intend to regulate your employeesâ speech, or otherwise take action against an employee for something that employee has said.
These exceptions not withstanding, your employees need to understand their lack of free speech rights as employees. I make this lesson a key point in my workplace social media training programs.
If so many of your employees operate under a misconceived and misunderstood notion of âfree speech,â then I believe that it is your responsibility as their employer to educate them. After all, if you are going to hold them accountable for what they say, itâs only fair that they understand their responsibilities and the related consequences.
Over the past two decades, digital technologies have enabled more and more companies to utilize remote and mobile workers.
Virtual teams are commonplace, and they offer benefits for both the employer and the employee. But developing a healthy virtual culture is vital to ensure dispersed team members feel connected, engaged and valued.
According to a Global Analytics Workplace survey, 4.3 million people work from home at least half of the time, and the telecommuter population has grown 11.7 percent since 2008. Data show that working remotely is desired by employees, and the trend of working off-site isnât going away.
Remote workers may consist of project teams working together at a remote site, individuals working independently and traveling frequently, such as salespersons, and people who work from home.
Communicating With Remote Teams
With project teams working in different locations, it is important for the leader to travel to the site regularly. Site visits allow the leader to pick up on subtle indicators of culture. Being there is often the only way the leader can assess the office environment: Do team members seem happy? Do they help each other? Do they engage in informal conversations or does everyone have their heads down? Do they feel supported by the company or cast away and forgotten?
By coming to the site, the leader can gauge what actions need to be taken to improve morale and connectedness. But more important, visiting the site lets the remote staff know that they are an important part of the team.
Research indicates the factor that most affects engagement at work is the employeeâs relationship with the direct manager, so having a strong connection to the local site manager is more important than connecting with corporate leaders.
Visits from corporate may be rare when companies entrust local leaders with developing a strong culture, especially if the local culture mirrors headquarters. But other companies take an extra step by conducting strategy and vision meetings at remote work sites to help ensure buy-in and strengthen connections.
In his book âDrive,â Daniel Pink points out that people are most engaged when they have autonomy, purpose and mastery at work. Autonomy is being able to work according to your own schedule and the way you like to work, free of micromanagement provided deadlines and goals are met.
Purpose is feeling that the work you do matters and that you are aligned with the values of your organization. Mastery is being able to do high quality work and improve every day. Managers can keep remote workers engaged by providing clear goals so they know what success looks like, letting them know what quality is expected, and communicating with them frequently to learn what they care about and explain how their work aligns with the companyâs goals.
Communicating With Individuals Working Remotely
Compared to on-site teams, more effort is required to make individuals working remotely feel connected. They are easily overlooked, whether intentionally or not.
An organization, for example, can address the âout of sight, out of mindâ problem during video conference calls by placing large photos of remote team members in chairs around the table so everyone in the meeting room can remember their remote colleagues.
Another tip for including remote workers in virtual meetings is to remember to send the agenda and other information well in advance rather than handing out materials in the meeting and realizing remote workers donât have them. This is also a good practice if you have introverts in the group who like to prepare and think about the topic ahead of time.
Another good practice is to have a meeting facilitator who can make sure remote workers get a chance to speak. It can be hard to know when to enter a conversation when you are on video or on the telephone; a facilitator can look for openings to bring in remote participants.
When it comes to people working from home, itâs vital to communicate standards and expectations. Do you expect them to be online and available during certain hours? Do you only care that the job gets done and not how long they are at their desks?
Setting clear expectations makes everyone know the boundaries and lessens the need to âcheck-upâ on remote workers. When people feel trusted they tend to live up to expectations.
If you manage remote workers, treat them as you would local staff. Make time for conversations, both work related and personal. Keep them aware of changes going on at headquarters and involve them in local activities such as charity events.
Because remote workers may not want to âbotherâ you constantly with minor concerns and comments, they may save them up until a later time. By then, however, issues may have been forgotten or may have festered and dealing with them may take longer than if they had been handled in the moment.
You may need to call on remote workers frequently to give them the opportunity to ask any questions and offer comments. Some managers post office hours when staff can drop in or call in; others establish set times each day for remote team leaders to check-in.
Providing feedback, both appreciative and developmental, is especially important for remote workers to help them know they are not toiling away in a forgotten backwater. Being aware of their career goals is also important; often remote workers must rely on their managers to keep them apprised of advancement opportunities within the organization.
With a little forethought, remote workers can feel appreciated as valuable members of your team.
Effective communication with internal staff ensures that all parties are on the same page. Without alignment on company goals, mission and values, confusion can easily ensue. Thatâs where Robyn Hannah steps in. As senior director of global communication at Dynamic Signal, an employee communication and engagement platform based in San Bruno, California, she leads the communication strategy both internally and externally, ensuring that employees know how to complete items as fundamental as signing up for health insurance to as complex as delivering business goals.
In an interview with Talent Economy [Workforce‘s sister publication], Hannah shared her observations of internal communication practices, what she sees for the future and suggestions for how to start a strong internal communication strategy on a dime. Edited excerpts follow.
TALENT ECONOMY:Â What exactly is internal communication and why is it important?
ROBYN HANNAH:Â Communication is the vehicle through which we disseminate corporate goals, business objectives and company culture. These things that make up the fabric of our organization disseminate to our employees, and from our employees to our customers, through communication. I think it is fundamentally how we create alignment within our company; itâs how we allow employees to know who we are as a company and what our values are; itâs how they understand our company goals, whether thatâs for the year or quarter; itâs how employees can prioritize.
If youâre dealing with a difficult customer and maybe they are operating outside of your business values, maybe you have to retire a customer. Some of those tough business decisions can be bounced against the framework of who you are as an organization, what your vision and mission and values are, and the only way for employees to know those things, to make those decisions and to have that criteria is by having some vehicle for delivery, which is truly internal communication.
“Someone has to create alignment. Your employees are your most-valued asset. You do not have a company without your employees.â
â Robyn Hannah, senior director of global communication at Dynamic Signal
TE:Â Historically, how has this role changed?
HANNAH:Â For different companies of different communication maturity levels, internal communication can mean different things. For some, itâs very tactical. Itâs blocking and tackling. Itâs hereâs your information. For a long time, the intranet or maybe posters in a breakroom have been internal communication for a lot of organizations. But that doesnât work anymore.
Technology has fundamentally changed the way that we communicate in our everyday lives. We live in this app economy where news and information and content push to us. No longer do we have this destination model. I donât go to the New York Times on my browser, right? I get a push notification, and that information that is being pushed to me is based on topics that Iâve self selected are relevant to me.
I think internal communication at companies is starting to reflect more the way that we communicate in our everyday lives. The enterprise has been a little behind. There are still a lot of companies that are using intranets and posters. Part of the evolution is that weâre moving to proactively providing employees news and information thatâs relevant for them to do their job, and weâre now able to deliver it in a way thatâs convenient for them.
At Dynamic Signal, our employee communication and engagement platform is designed to meet employees where theyâre at with targeted, relevant, timely content and information delivered to them on the channel that is most convenient for the way that they work. If you are in finance and you sit behind a computer all day, maybe getting internal communication about your open enrollment period or a new leadership appointment via email makes sense for you. Maybe youâll read your email. But if you are a sales executive, when youâre looking in your inbox, youâre only looking for customers and trying to close business. Youâll mentally ignore those internal emails as, âI can get back to that later.â But what if theyâre really important?
If the goal of internal communication is to align employees to business objectives and goals, disseminate culture and values, help employees prioritize their day and make sure that theyâre getting the information they need as efficiently as possible, we need to find ways to get it to them in a way that makes sense for them. Thatâs a big part of the evolution.
Beyond that, whatâs been really interesting is weâre seeing more and more appointments of chief communication officers. The CCO is a relatively new C-suite position, but it seems like every week weâre seeing more large companies appoint somebody as CCO. Theyâre really consolidating communication under one org, whereas in the past, maybe internal communication sat under HR or operations, and external communication â things like social media, public relations â sat under a marketing team.
The problem is that today, the speed of communication, the fact that everybody is on mobile and everyone is getting news and information at their fingertips all the time via news apps and Twitter, thereâs no longer a sense of internal communication and external communication. Itâs really confidential communication and everything else.
The other really important and I think notable advance in internal communication is around measurement. So many other parts of the organization, especially marketing, have become very data driven. And historically, internal comms has been seen as this soft, cushy part of the business. We put an email out there and said, âOpen enrollment starts now. Please read. Action required!â We didnât have any measurement. We didnât know what was happening with penetration; we didnât know what employee sentiment was; we didnât know what employee engagement was; we didnât know how employees were feeling or receiving the information. It was this sort of spray and pray mentality. Communication now looks at things beyond just open rates but engagement, time on page, are employees taking action on some of the information theyâre given?
I think measurement is how communications will continue to earn a seat at the table. Itâs hard to get budget or authority when you donât have data. Communicators I think have always known that internal communication is critical when it comes to things like alignment, understanding business goals and objectives, driving culture throughout the organization. But if you have no way of measuring that, you canât prove that. You canât get resources or budget or headcount to support those efforts.
TE:Â In your position at Dynamic Signal, what do you communicate internally and externally?
HANNAH:Â Thereâs so much! We want to make sure our employees know how to enroll in the 401(k) or go see the doctor. We want them to have those sort of basic, HR communication functions, but it can also be the lunch menu for the week or our holiday schedule.
We have things like Women of DySi and Pets of DySi and DySi Cares, which is our CSR group. So we have these employee affinity groups that people can choose to join and connect with other employees around issues that are important to them. We have this whole internal channel of people who submit photos of their pets. Itâs been fun to see these other sides of your colleaguesâ lives that you wouldnât normally see.
We also want our employees to be very well-informed about what our company goals are. Our CEO sends video messages saying, âGreat Q1! Hereâs what happened and what weâre looking to accomplish in Q2.â We also host all-hands meetings with an AMA [Ask Me Anything] session. Weâll send out that notification to all of our employees through different channels â whichever channel works best for them â and we let them know that this is coming up and they can submit questions that they want to ask the CEO. I think our objectives are always ensuring that employees feel celebrated, connected, aligned, know what our goals and objectives are and that they feel valued as people.
On the external side of things, weâre sharing what weâre doing in the industry, our thought leadership and some of our research externally, but itâs not enough for us to just share that from our own branded channels. In my role as far as public relations and media relations go, itâs exciting to get to go speak to communications professionals and share all of this, but itâs really important for us that our employees feel empowered to be storytellers, too.
We are very careful about who we hire because we want every employee to feel empowered to be a brand ambassador and an employee advocate. We push a lot of our news out to our employees to share across their own networks, in their own voice. And different employees share different things. Thatâs perfect because everyone brings a unique and diverse perspective to the company, and we use our communication tools to empower them to tell those stories externally. We believe that external storytelling success begins with internal communication.
“External storytelling success begins with internal communication.â
â Robyn Hannah, senior director of global communication at Dynamic Signal
TE:Â For smaller companies that might not have the funds for an internal communication role, who typically owns this, and what advice would you have for them?
HANNAH:Â Internal communication is a non-negotiable. Someone has to create alignment. Your employees are your most-valued asset. You do not have a company without your employees. And employees who donât know what your goals are as a business, donât know who you are as a company and what your values are and what your mission is, they canât function and you will not be successful as an organization if you ignore the fact that employees are your most-valued asset. Whether itâs an executive or HR or someone in marketing, communicating with your most-valued asset â the people who truly represent your business to the world â is a non-negotiable.
I think you just have to start, even if you have nothing in place. Someone has to say, âOur employees are important; they need to know whatâs happening in the company; they need to know what weâre driving to as a company; they need to know that we value them because we recognize we donât have a business without them.â
If all you have is email, start with email. If all you have is an open space where you can gather people together, go face time. If youâre a small company and can get everybody in one space, great. Or use Skype or Google Teams or whatever digital tool you need to get people together.
My advice is to start doing something. And sometimes asking forgiveness is better than asking permission. We all have a phone in our pocket with video and camera capability. You can start a free social media account and start to take photos and video of your employees and what their day-to-day looks like. Celebrate the people who make your company what it is. Highlight and showcase them. Create a sense of pride and loyalty. Start to empower them to tell their story on social media. That doesnât cost any money.
This story originally appeared in Workforce‘s sister publication Talent Economy.
Adults draw on a combination of these coping mechanisms but usually have a preference for one over the other. When taken to its extreme, this preference becomes dysfunctional and can result in some bad behavior.
