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Let's Talk About: How can organizations respond during inflation and recession?
Kiy Watts • November 4, 2022
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A few weeks ago, I was shopping in my neighborhood grocery store, and went to grab a carton of 18-eggs (store brand), and it was $7.59. *insert jaw drop* Immediately, I thought this must be a mistake. I began mumbling to myself about it, and another shopper chimed in, with the same dismay as me. We both settled on a carton of 12 for $5.09, the thought of paying $7.59 for eggs, didn't sit right in my spirit! After shopping, I went home to tell my 14 year old son, no more testing tik-tok recipes calling for a half dozen eggs! SN: He once made two 3 egg omelets, because he forgot to add cheese. SMH!
I started thinking, if I had immediate sticker shock over eggs, how would my team members feel while doing the same thing as me, trying to take care of ourselves and families.
Let’s be clear, going from pandemic to stubborn inflation, and now recession has been taxing, to say the least! Organizations were tasked with figuring out the best response to the Coronavirus pandemic. With many stepping up, going above and beyond to support their team members and communities during a time of uncertainty and fear.
I see inflation and recession as no different. It’s an opportunity for organizations to show they care. Similar to coronavirus being the first pandemic for many of us. An entire generation of team members were not in the workforce in 2008, during the last recession, and aren’t experienced during times like this.
As we face increasing prices on goods and services, and the recent announcement from the FED to increase interest rates once more, it’s important that organizations seek ways to support their team members during another set of turbulent times.
Here are 6 steps (in no particular order) an organization can take today to support their team members during recession:
Conduct a ‘down and dirty’ compensation review
- If you haven’t conducted your annual compensation analysis, take a moment to review your salaries across the organization. Look for outliers against the respective salary band. Does anyone fall below the start of the salary range? Do you have tenured team members who aren’t close to the median? Understand why and address those issues.
Evaluate team member benefits and perks
- Do you offer financial planning and wellness benefits? If so, broadly communicate those across the organization. If possible, partner with your broker or carrier, to host a town hall style meeting focused on financial planning and wellness.
- Ensure team members are aware of employee assistance programs that offer mental wellness counseling, emergency financial assistance, and tuition reimbursement.
- Stand up or re-communicate discounted programs such as cell phone services, gyms, pet services, commuter programs, etc.
Lean into Learning & Development
- Support the personal and professional growth of your team members and Leaders.
- Upskilling (and/or reskilling) is a great way to recession proof a career. If you don’t have a robust L&D function, you can accomplish this by offering opportunities such as, stretch assignments, experiential learning, and cross functional collaboration and exposure.
Be transparent about organizational strategy
- Ensure enterprise level goals and objectives are cascaded down to departments and team members. This provides team members a clear connection to how their work contributes to the outcomes of the business.
- Update team members regularly on the performance and financial health of the organization.
- When decisions are made which impact team members, communicate the 5 Ws & 1 H- who, what, when, where, why, and how.
Revisit the Return to Office plan
- Consider a plan that considers flexibility in start/end times and days of the week in the office.
- Provide on site child care or access to discounted services.
- Find ways to surprise and delight team members with gas or grocery cards.
Develop a culture of trust and physiological safety
- Equip your Leaders with the data, knowledge, skills, and tools, so they may confidently have sensitive discussions. For instance, what’s your pay philosophy, are you a pay for performance organization and what does that mean, how do you arrive at merit decisions over cost of living increases?
- Provide a safe place for team members to ask questions about pay, equity, growth and development.
- Leverage your leaders as champions to get information to team members. Ensure they are aware of services and programs available to assist team members in need.
- Be sure to keep all people resources in an easily accessible place like an intranet or teams channel.
HR Professionals are literally creating the playbook for the future of work, stay inspired knowing you are doing meaningful work! I applaud organizations and HR teams who are ahead of the game in supporting their team members and leaders during this time, and those in preparation.
If you or your organization are in need of expert People coaching or consulting, I would be happy to help!
Thanks for reading!
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Years ago, when I was dating my now husband, he called me the fixer like Olivia Pope. He said anytime there was a challenge, I would find a solution and fix it. At the time, I took it as a compliment. In my family, if someone has a problem, I’m the one they call for the answer. As I reflect, that characteristic followed me into my career. I saw it as helping and taking care of my people. Honestly, I have always pride myself on being a helpful resource to others. Makes sense I landed in a profession focused on helping people. As I put in work professionally, this was great for my career. I became the go-to person for all things, I was the utility player on the team. A real Taysom Hill for my Saints fans out there! However, as I transitioned into Leadership roles, what I discovered was the thin line between being a fixer and unknowingly creating a stifling work environment. It was tough figuring out the balance between fixing and taking over. I can admit, there were times I was taking over when I should have been leading. Lived experiences, good intentions and comfort were the reasons. The good intention was wanting to help the team be successful and the comfort was this was where I felt most valuable. However, over time, I learned me “fixing” was hurting the team and myself with a trickle-down effect to the organization. I've mentioned my love for reading, but I find many leadership books to read very academic, which is a turn off for my attention span. However, one of my favorite leadership books, the Coaching Habit by 📚 Michael Bungay Stanier, is an easy read and he inserts a bit of humor. The first time I read it in 2 days. If you haven’t heard of it, check it out. From the Coaching Habit, I learned, I’m a rescuer and my advice monster is “save-it.” As a rescuer, the moment I hear, “how do I,” “what should I do,” “can you,” I’m immediately springing into action. Michael Bungay Stanier, describes the rescuer as constantly leaping to solve problems, jumping to offer advice, taking over responsibilities others should rightfully keep for themselves. Hmm, sounds about right! I had a Leader to tell me, you are in the middle of everything (and it was meant as a compliment). I knew I was and felt the heaviness of being in the middle of it all, I was tired, frustrated, and felt unproductive. I thought there was value in being the fixer or rescuer as described in the Coaching Habit, but as I looked back at certain situations, I learned it limits creativity, critical thinking, growth, removes accountability, and creates a woe is me mentality for the team. I recall a situation where a member of my team came to me with a problem. I immediately sprung into to action (Kiy to the rescue), I didn’t even know the real issue! I was excited to help, offering up solutions, shared examples from the past, only to be told by the team member, I could do it how I wanted it. Say what now?!?!? In the moment I was like excuse me?? The exchange was via email so maybe something was lost in translation. I later realized my mistake; the team member didn’t want me to fix the issue, but I took over and in the process removed their autonomy and creativity. In the process frustrating both of us. Yes, the "do it how you want it" comment was out of pocket, but I saw passed the response and adjusted my behavior to not jump as a fixer, every time someone had a problem. A few weeks ago, my now husband called me a fixer again, but this time I corrected him. I explained why I wasn’t a fixer and how that was problematic in the work environment and doesn't provide a place for anyone to grow and thrive. 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Set clear expectations and let people run We hire people with great skills and talents, as a Leader, it’s our job to let them run and contribute at the top of their license. That won’t happen if you are being a helicopter Leader. Being clear of goals, roles and aligning the work and business needs is a motivator and satisfier. Setting clear expectations is like giving an address to a destination. Today we technology through navigation systems which will give us at least 3 routes to reach our destination. As a Leader, your role is to provide the address and let the team reach the destination how they best see fit. The team should articulate to you which route they are taking and keep you up to date through regular check ins. 3. Provide support by removing barriers to success (including you) While the team heads toward the destination, your role is to regularly check in, ask the right questions, share necessary updates, and provide support by removing barriers. Barriers can show up as lack of resources or training, internal and external relationships, organizational processes and structures, and even you. As the Leader, you can support the team with closing gaps around resources, training, and processes. Support can look like allowing the team to identify potential solutions and/or workarounds to these issues in order to keep momentum. This will grow your team into Leaders and minimize these issues in the future. Certain issues around internal or external relationships and structures may require some involvement by you, but include the team where appropriate. Ask them how they would approach to the situation and bring them along for the journey. Recognize when you are being the barrier to progress. Allow your team to solve issues without taking over. Roadblocks can be discouraging, but keep the team aligned to the mission at hand. 4. Celebrate success When the team is on track and making progress toward the destination, take time to encourage more of those behaviors and performance. Incorporate the use of project management tools. These tools are useful to not only keep the project moving, but also easily identify wins. Some team members like public recognition while others don’t. Be sure you are pulling the right lever for each person to ensure you are meeting their needs. As projects are completed, in addition to postmortem discussions, include an element of celebration. If all the team is pushing out work and not celebrating, disengagement can set in and works becomes repetitive and boring. Next time, you feel the urge to fix a problem or rescue a team member or even a peer, slow down and remember being a fixer doesn’t leave room for growth, diversity of perspectives, critical thinking and accountability. Long term, it can drain, frustrate and disengage the team. Imagine what the opposite can do! 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I recently had a Leader say they aren’t seeing the value coming from HR. Ouch, a dagger straight to my heart! Instead of becoming defensive, I asked a few clarifying questions and went into reflection. By the end of the conversation, I thanked the Leader for the feedback and we ended on the same page. Most HR/People functions are working hard to sustain or build a positive, robust employee experience. Everyone is focused on a “people first” culture because it’s become a commercial advantage. *Insert TV commercials showcasing employee value propositions!* It’s no wonder why my inbox is bombarded with marketing claims to have the silver bullet for hiring, onboarding, turnover, DEI, learning and development, remote work, people analytics, well-being, and it goes on and on. I’m not knocking the hustle because we do need help! The same day the Leader made the comment, I had call with an Account Manager from Culture Amp, and he said: “People don’t want more choices, they want to feel confident in the choices they have.” I wrote it down because it caught my attention, googled it and Scott Galloway’s quote came up: “Choice is a tax on your time and attention. Consumers don’t want more choice, they want confidence in the choices presented.” The context of the quote is through a sales and marketing lens, but it can easily be translated into the employee experience. I asked myself this question, from an HR perspective, have we truly mastered and given time to the fundamentals before adding something new to the mix? Have we built confidence in the organization around our core offerings? If I’m being honest, the answer is no. We have chased shiny pennies because we have been made to believe more is better instead of focusing on mastering and building confidence in the fundamentals. A few months ago, I chatted with another HR Leader, who recently launched 6 new employee resource groups (ERG) in their organization. His intentions were in the right place, but things became overwhelming and created unexpected tasks for an already overworked HR team, who now has responsibility to act on the feedback from the 6 groups. In hindsight, he acknowledged it would have been best to launch 3 groups to build confidence and rapport with team members. He said he would have gone slow to go fast. That's a great example of less choices and more confidence. As we see budgets tighten, I think it’s time HR put the mirror up to our faces, and honestly answer the question. Are we chasing shiny pennies or building confidence around the fundamentals, which cement our reputation, drive employee experience, and ultimately add to the success of the organization? So, before we chase shiny pennies and add more, let’s ask if what we have, has been mastered.
