Leadership and Management – Hanyok Communications

Every quarter, employees gather in the cafeteria for town hall meetings. The tables are removed, and seats are placed in neat rows. The podium, microphone, and projector screen are tested and ready.

As employees enter the room and take their seats, the senior vice president who will present the latest company information talks quietly with one of his direct reports. At 9 o’clock he steps up to the podium, says good morning and begins reading the first slide. By the third slide, the employees look bored and ready to leave.

Meetings like this don’t work. Employees prefer hearing company information from leaders who talk with them, not to them and engage them in authentic conversation and actions.

Polls have shown that most employees are not engaged, even during town hall meetings. It doesn’t have to be that way.

Leaders can turn boring town hall meetings into engaging experiences that score big with employees. As communicators, it’s our job to help leaders do it well so that they increase their credibility and build trust, which helps employees connect with the individual and the organization. Continue reading Score Big with Town Hall Meetings

If safety isn’t your organization’s No. 1 priority, your business is at higher risk. Workplace injuries have far-reaching ramifications beyond the injured employee. Consider the effects on the employee’s family, other employees, the HR and legal departments and the organization’s reputation.

Every employee must be kept safe at work, and after their workday, they all should go home to their families as healthy as they came to work. Imagine if one of your employees didn’t go home to his or her family at the end of their workday. But you don’t have to have an accident or injury to see the risks when safety is not a priority. A series of near misses can have serious implications for workplace morale, organizational productivity and brand reputation.

Safety should be a way of doing business, not a short-term initiative that gets pushed down to employees until the concern recedes. Just as with other aspects of the business, leaders have a major role in the success of safety efforts.

A few basic ideas and practices can help any organization begin to address safety issues and move toward a safety culture that will help ensure the safety of employees, visitors, and perhaps even others in your community. Continue reading Safety First Every Day