New Conventions for Layoff Messages
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Guidelines for communicating layoffs are shifting, which may have implications for other bad-news messages. A Wall Street Journal article discusses which day of the week (now Wednesday instead of Friday), how deep to cut, how much severance to offer, and how to decide who goes.
The most obvious shift is away from the business communication wisdom of delivering bad news in person. Why call remote workers into the office only to fire them?
We could say the same for other types of bad news: cutting bonuses or benefits, giving a “below-expectations” performance review, or ending a project. Maybe the best wisdom is to follow communication norms. If a weekly one-on-one meeting is in person, then that would be an appropriate place and time to talk about negative customer feedback. The medium might raise bigger questions about typical communications. If the most typical communication is by text, then, maybe a text is best, but why is that the most typical way of communicating?
Of course, timing is an issue, so these regularly scheduled meetings might not be ideal. Then, what’s the secondary way to communicate? By phone? By email? The decision also depends on the severity of the news—a career-ended change or a minor setback? The guiding principle in articles seems to be that employees could complain publicly; perhaps a better guide is compassion—being humane and prioritizing employees’ feelings over our own reluctance to give bad news.
Back in 2015, in the 9th edition of Business Communication, I softened the “indirect style” recommendation for bad-news messages—adding a “buffer” and giving reasons before the main point. Research hasn’t supported this organizational strategy, and corporate messages that follow this “soften-the-blow” approach are ridiculed. Employees typically know when bad news is coming—or they should if managers have been doing their job.
In the past, faculty spent too much time worrying about sequence within a message; this is a non-issue in articles about layoff message like the Wall Street Journal’s. Companies need to worry more about the sequence and timing of multiple messages, which are often posted online because they wind up there anyway. No spoiler alert, but Episode 3 of Succession on HBO, Season 3, is an interesting example.
