Have you ever been a part of a back-office crisis? Maybe resulting from mismanagement, employee or financial under-performance, control or compliance issues? Or even worse, fraud?
Let’s be honest, there is not one organization, business, or entity out there that hasn’t had to deal with a disaster in one form or another. It is one of the many costs of doing business and at most times — unavoidable.
All organizations struggle in the aftermath of a disaster. From culture to poor planning — performance and processes can be the culprit. Unfortunately, there is no magic formula or best practice that completely eliminates the risk of occurrence. A combination of strong leadership and strategy can minimize the after effects of a back-office disaster once it strikes your organization. Remaining positive, aligning strong communication, developing a plan and keeping employees in mind are critical areas to focus on.
Below are some strategies management can utilize during turbulent times:
Turn a Negative into a Positive
How an organization reacts during and after an administrative crisis is critical to prevent damaging Company reputation and employee morale. Most organizations that respond to disasters and crises in a reactive manner spend too much time chasing their tail while no real meaningful change happens. Generally, in these situations, it is seen that management:
- Immediately goes into crisis mode
- Limits communication and/or is secretive
- Deploys resources inefficiently toward the perceived problem
- Interrupts business operations with the “fixes” or “investigations” further compounding the issues
Problems typically are driven by underlying organizational issues and culture. Because of this, the “fix” is so essential to an organization seeking a positive, lasting change. As leaders and advisers, we should expect the unexpected. But that doesn’t mean being caught off guard. Every organization should have tools in place, including items such as: relevant policies and procedures, checklists, sample public statements, etc. — ready to deploy when chaos and disaster strike. The one positive that can come from any disaster is that management has a one-time opportunity to solve the underlying issue. The old cliché of turning a negative into a positive cannot be over-emphasized in the case of a disaster striking your organization. So be ready to make a change when the opportunity presents itself.
Communicate with your Actions, Quash the Rumors
Benjamin Franklin once stated, “Believe none of what you hear, and half of what you see.” Stories and rumors always have a way of evolving into absolute worst case scenarios. Of course, blaming comes shortly thereafter.
Did the A/P clerk really negotiate the contract and overpay the vendor? Was the accountant qualified to be responsible for complicated tax and accounting decisions? Questions such as these have the capacity to seriously hinder organizational performance after a disaster. Stopping these types of questions reduces the velocity of the disaster and speed up the path towards a viable and long-term solution. Some simple steps:
- Conduct open and transparent meetings with management and staff — this ensures facts are obtained and gives management the opportunity to tell their side of the story while generating employee goodwill. Meetings will show staff that management is both serious about the issue and ready to take action. Communication is paramount.
- Communicate the meeting objectives — Set expectations for employees at this step to ensure relevant parties are held accountable for their part in developing the future strategies to address the issues.
- Share responsibility — By sharing responsibility, management takes ownership and reduces the employees need to participate in the “blame game.”
Take note, this step isn’t about saving people from blame but about understanding the problem accurately in order to develop a workable solution. Everybody should share in the problem as well as the solution. The further away the story is from the truth, the longer it takes to get the matter resolved.
Take Inventory of Issues and Prioritize
Satisfied that relevant facts and circumstances have been collected and all are on the same page? If yes, how do you form a game plan that ultimately leads to a solution? One effective way is to be systematic in your approach. Since you won’t be able to address all items right away, you need to prioritize. When you dig deep into any issue, many more issues will be identified which ultimately may bring about a perceived need for “quick-fixes”. If you try to address everything right way — not only will this drain your staff — problems will only get half-solved at best. Try the following:
- Identify critical areas that are lacking substantive attention by management and employees.
- Document each item along with a plan on how to address them.
- List broken areas together with the corresponding current and recommended future state as management and employees see the issues.
- Assign an owner and team to each problem area.
Prioritize ranking for each of the problem areas. By taking the systematic route, you improve the odds of creating effective and sustainable solutions that provide real value for the organization.
Remember the Staff
Nothing tanks workplace morale faster than employee fear after a disaster. How do you prevent staff alienation during times of stress and organizational change?
Before we answer that question — let’s get back to you — the leader. It is literally impossible not to have a strong reaction when the unexpected happens — especially if it is on your watch. Strong and negative reactions alienate staff. These days, culture is so important. New Deloitte research shows that culture, engagement, and employee retention are now the top talent challenges facing business leaders. More than half of business leaders rate this issue “urgent” — up from only around 20% last year. An environment where employees are fearful leads to dissatisfaction and lowers productivity levels, and ultimately turnover. Some quick strategies on leadership and staff relations:
- Test your leadership skills by staying composed.
- Take ownership and let the staff see it. Especially in smaller companies that can be rather reactive in nature.
- Communicate the issues to the staff so they understand and can even assist as a collaborative team.
- Use the issues that occurred as an opportunity to change some negative aspects of your culture.
Next Steps
Senior leadership is key to the long-term success of any change initiatives. Get their buy in early and ensure that they see the long term benefits from needed change. If there is no support from the C-suite, we are back to short-term reactive and ineffective change management. Remember — leadership and strategy is key:
- Deploy a strong combination of leaders, closers and workers.
- It’s easy to begin a project to address the issue — harder to close the project down — manage the project to ensure progress is being made.
Conclusion
Our adaptation to ongoing changes in business and people has made us great leaders and advisers. This even plays into our management style. We make sound decisions based on our experience and instinct.
When the unexpected happens, unknowingly our emotions will derail our usual fair and balanced thought process and communication styles.
Therefore, to mitigate against this reaction always remember these points: a) keep your composure; b) think through a plan; c) deploy resources; and d) manage the action plans to ensure completion.
Lake Michigan Partners specializes in assisting clients as an objective source to help you through your problems from inception to correction. We work with our clients to develop process and procedures proactively that will minimize risk and maximize value to the Company.
Learn more about us at www.lakemichiganpartners.com.