Elegantly Influencing Employee’s Behaviors in Tough Economic Times

In any time of economic uncertainty, most employees quickly begin to feel “stressed out” about their future employment with a company. The intensity of the employees stressful feelings is closely related to how much their company is impacted by an economic downturn. For example, employees of manufacturers selling goods to the commercial construction industry have suffered damaging reductions in profits. According to the president and CEO of a major commercial construction tool manufacturer, the decreased profits were inevitable with the onslaught of soaring freight, shipping, transportation, and raw materials costs. In addition to that, equipment and tool sales to the residential construction market has been continually sinking for over a year. Companies such as Bosch, Dewalt, Fastenal, and others all agree that the residential market won’t turn upward for at least two more years. As a result, thousands of people have lost their jobs, their homes, and their credit rating.

If you were the president and/or CEO in a company suffering staggering decrease in profitability and shareholder value, similar to companies competing in the commercial and residential construction market, what message would you communicate to your employees?

Our research shows that leaders who are elegantly influential act swiftly to address the most obvious threat to their employees’ morale – the feelings of uncertainty about their future with the company. They combat that threat first because employees feeling unsure become increasingly unproductive at a rapid pace. Other than wasting company time talking to other employees, they also start abusing company resources to update their resumes and often use vacation days for interviews. And, unfortunately, those without vacation time may deceptively take sick leave for the same purpose. By now, you undoubtedly recognize the detrimental impact such behavior would have on any company already enduring turbulent times. Most likely, you also fully realize the degree of urgency in handling employees’ uncertainty. It is priority one. However, it is highly recommended that you, the leader, eliminate uncertainty within yourself beforehand. The reason is simple. If employees sense uncertainty in you, the emotional reaction will spiral your company into a tailspin.

Elegantly influential leaders take the necessary steps to rid themselves of uncertainty, which, for some, includes prayer or meditation; after which they focus on the reality of the situation. They avoid conjuring up images that make the situation worse than it is. They also spend more time focusing on resolving the problem rather than continually rehashing the issues that created the problem. They tap into the collective wisdom of other leaders who have successfully weathered a similar storm. They rally the most brilliant, tenacious, and emotionally strong leaders within their own company, develop a vision for making things better, and quickly begin to strategically and tactically implement a plan to bring that vision to fruition. Afterward, they communicate with absolute certainty the truth of the situation to employees, the vision of how to better the situation, and the plan to bring about the vision.

In closing, an elegantly influential leader intuitively moves to stabilize his emotions and takes steps to solidify a sense of certainty within himself before communicating with employees. In doing so, the employees will be influenced by his certainty and passion as he describes, not only how they will survive, but also how they will thrive during tough economic times.