Good communications

The CDC is being criticized for holding only two briefings in 2021.

That criticism is justified. In a crisis, uncertainty adds fuel to the fire. Frequent, accurate and practical information from the authorities can keep things under control.

At my company, in the early days of the pandemic, I noticed an important change. My leadership not only increased the frequency of its communications but also the quality. They not only increased the amount of technical support (for remote work) but also of emotional support (for all employees). Significantly, that effort hasn’t let up yet.

Whether it’s a pandemic or a new gift policy, a change from what was normal requires good communication.

What change are you about to experience at work in the coming weeks? How well will you communicate it?

Clarity and compliance

Some members of Congress, on both sides of the aisle, are proposing to change the Electoral Count Act of 1887.

They assert, rightly so, that the law is poorly written and behind the times. More importantly, they believe it played a key role in the insurrection of 2021 by poorly defining the role of the Vice-President.

Do you have a policy at work that is difficult to understand? Perhaps it was written by lawyers for lawyers, instead of being written in plain English for employees? Maybe you have an “email policy” that hasn’t been updated to account for mobile devices and social media, leaving new and young employees perplexed?

Such policies create uncertainty. At best, this uncertainty creates a drag on your operations (people avoid doing things they should do for fear of getting in trouble). At worst, they protect wrongdoers who can claim that they didn’t understand the policy (we’ve all seen this).

Like laws, corporate policies are intended to be followed. Let’s write them accordingly.

Happy birthday

Is it ethical to use company funds to celebrate an employee’s birthday?

If you own a small restaurant with 3 employees, and serve them a free meal as a birthday gift, there’s nothing wrong with that.

What if your company counts 200,000 employees and is publicly traded? If you spend only $10 per employee, that’s a $2M expense every year. Is that a good use of the shareholder’s money?

What if your customers are mostly government entities? Your revenue is actually tax revenue. Is that a good use of taxpayer’s money?

What if you don’t stop at birthdays but also celebrate births, weddings and funerals? How big should an “employee morale” budget line be?

Please let me know your thoughts in the comment section below.

Contempt

In a misguided effort to encourage unvaccinated citizens to get a shot, the French President just insulted 13 million of his voters. By doing so, he probably further entrenched the recalcitrants.

Perhaps you work for a company where some employees still refuse to get vaccinated. While it is your duty to try to change their mind (you could literally be saving lives), you must do it with compassion, not contempt.

Once contempt infiltrates a relationship, that relationship is doomed.

Starting fresh

When you get a new phone, you can set it up by copying everything from the old one. Or, you can set it up manually and “start fresh”. The first option is very convenient. The other forces you to consider whether you really need all these apps.

When you do your annual budget, you can tweak last year’s. Or, you can do a zero-base budget and “start fresh”. The first option is less painful. The other forces you to consider every upcoming expense.

When you create your 2022 E&C communication and training plan, you can use this year’s plan and (kinda) change the topics. Or, you can create one based on your latest risks and violations and “start fresh”. The first option offers less friction. The other sends the message to your employees that you (and them) are not engaging in a check-the-box exercise.

Headlines

The original internet was in the bibliography of books.

You read something interesting in a book, followed the footnote to the bibliography, then went to read that book. So on and so forth. You actually learned something.

The real internet has made this process easier. Yet, most people only read headlines. Headlines claiming that climate change is not real, that vaccinations are bad for you, that Elvis is still alive, and that the Earth is flat. And people Tweet those headlines, and re-Tweet them.

Next time you come across one of these articles, look for the source links (i.e. the bibliography). You probably won’t find any. If you do, you’ll soon see how unreliable they are, pointing only to other articles without sources.

May you be healthy

Picture this factory of 500 employees, somewhere in the U.S.

In the last two years, more than 80 employees were injured by a specific machine, some very seriously. One employee even died.

Many of the employees are not using the machine correctly. Some don’t even wear the protective equipment provided by the company. Strangely, when the company decided to impose safety training and threatened to fire employees not wearing the protective equipment, some employees protested, claiming it was their right to get injured if they wanted to.

Of course, that factory doesn’t exist.

Of course, it’s an allegory about the pandemic.

As another strange year comes to a close, this is my wish for all my readers for 2022: May you be happy, may you be healthy, may you be at peace.

Retaliation and attracting talent

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, in 2021 so far, 293 journalists were put in prison because of their job (50 of them in China) and 24 were killed (source).

If you were offered a journalist job in China, might you hesitate?

Let’s imagine a company where, this year, 293 employees were demoted after reporting their boss’s wrongdoing, and 24 were terminated.

If you were offered a job there, might you hesitate?

Who is your training designed for?

Imagine an old-fashioned weight scale.

Now imagine using it to measure who your compliance training is for.

On one side, you would place weights on behalf of your employees, measuring your desire to help them do their job compliantly.

On the other side, you would place weights measuring your desire to meet the enforcement authorities’ requirements, to track completions, to automate reminders, to please your board, etc.

Which way would the scale tip?

Bad processes lead to bad behavior

The employee who reports wrongdoing should receive an answer to two questions after the investigation:

Did you take action against the wrongdoer?
Did you change the system or process that contributed to the wrongdoing?

Too often, the second question is ignored, both by the company and the victim.

Which is why the same wrongdoing happens over and over again.