Remaining Resilient, Part 2: How to Maintain Trust and Morale After Layoffs - Tips for Leaders, Managers and Team Builders
The American economy has certainly seen a lot of changes in the past few years, and the end of 2022 has brought with it another huge round of layoffs in multiple sectors, including nearly 120,000 recent job losses in technology alone. No one in the workforce is unaffected by losses of this magnitude; those who have retained their jobs, those who have lost them, and those responsible for keeping a company going are all making adjustments.
In the next few weeks, the Bespoken blog will be dedicated to helping team members and managers alike navigate the changing tides.
Company restructuring can be uncomfortable for everyone, and team members will likely feel overwhelmed by absorbing work left behind by their former colleagues or unsure of their own status at the company. During a time of layoffs and shifting priorities, a manager’s first priority needs to be guiding their team through the transition.
Read on for some tips on building trust and maintaining morale with your team.
Avoid Sugar Coating
Establishing a sense of trust with your team is the foundation for a healthy and successful work environment, and in times of tumult, it’s absolutely critical. The best way to find that trust with your team and ensure future success is through transparency.
The modern workforce has evolved to expect more warmth and compassion from managers, rather than a tougher persona, as may have been the case in the past. These days, teams want a connection from their managers, and forming those connections will help you deliver difficult news in a professional and respectful manner.
It’s tempting to sugar coat bad news to keep your team from worrying more than you feel they should, but sugar coating will ultimately be counter-productive; team members are very familiar with their work environment, and if there’s something important you are not telling them, chances are they will know, which will cause them to distrust you right away. Be honest about the situation at hand, answer questions directly, and make yourself available to answer any additional questions to the best of your ability. Doing so will allow your team to stay focused on the work in front of them rather than spend their time speculating about what’s going on at the company.
Allow Space to Process
Layoffs will naturally come with a sense of loss, but the loss is not contained to personnel or productivity. Remaining team members will miss many of their colleagues and have to adjust to a new environment, both in terms of professional relationships and expectations they had for their own roles at the company.
Allowing space for everyone to process the change and feel disappointed is not only in the best interest of the team, but for you as a manager as well. It may be tempting to go straight into battle mode when the status quo has been shaken, but be careful of pushing too hard too quickly; you may find yourself getting frustrated that the team isn’t ready to storm the castle just yet. If you are willing to give everyone the space they need to get through it, it will be much easier to rally the team and get back on the horse once the period of grieving is over.
Acknowledge the Situation When You Ask for More
If your workplace is downsizing, restructuring, or in a state of making hard decisions, you may find yourself in the middle of an “all-hands-on-deck” situation to meet established deadlines, which means your staff will need to roll up their sleeves and do some hard work to keep projects on track. It’s perfectly normal to ask them for help in a tough situation, but you need to be careful about how you ask.
Acknowledging this state of triage will go a long way in helping your team buckle down and work together to get it done. Make it clear that this is a temporary situation rather than the new norm, and be as specific as possible: “we need you to take on X for the next three months, then once that’s off your plate, resume doing Y and Z.” Striking the right balance between the need for increased focus and a sense of optimism in the moment is important: this may be a difficult time, but it will get better.
Furthermore, keeping up with each member of your team on an individual level will help provide the support they may need to get through a chaotic situation. Be explicitly clear about how their goals are going to have to shift and ask about their biggest concerns and how you can help them with those adjustments.
Avoid Unreasonable Expectations
It’s important to stress to your team that the tough times will be temporary, but naturally, you have to mean it. Expecting your team to rise to a permanent state of triage is not realistic, nor will it do you any favors when it comes to maintaining trust with your colleagues. Keeping your expectations realistic will reduce resentment, which is absolutely vital to surviving tough times; resentment will be the surest possible way to ensure your team loses focus.
When changes in the workplace come with very real stakes, it may be tempting to micro-manage your team and keep an eye on every single task that’s been changed or re-assigned. Beware of this attitude; added pressure will likely have the opposite effect. Team members are going to be feeling the pressure already, so there’s no reason to add any more. Your team is valuable and qualified to handle the work; otherwise they wouldn’t be on the team in the first place. Be clear in your expectations, then trust your team to get it done.
Lead by Example
A manager’s first priority may be to help their team navigate through the difficult times, but managers still have plenty of work of their own they need to accomplish, and that can certainly be overwhelming. The good news: continuing to do your own job will still help the rest of your team as long as they can see how you’re doing it. Stay optimistic while working on your projects and leave all channels of communication open. Managers need accountable, communicative employees, and the best way to ask for that in your team is to embody those qualities in your own day-to-day practices.
Opening the lines of communication does not just apply to your team; it should also apply to your professional relationship with your boss. Learn to manage up and talk to those in upper management about successes and concerns you have. The more you feel you can communicate with your managers, the more your team will feel they can communicate with you.
About the Author
Jackie Miller launched Bespoken in 2015 to channel years of professional performance experience into techniques that improve public speaking, presenting, and professional communication skills. She holds a B.F.A. and M.A. both from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts.
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