Written by Krishna De, Managing Director, Oneocean Group

With all the talk about increasing unemployment - The British Chambers of Commerce warned on 8th July that unemployment is set to rise 300,000 by the end of next year - is it any wonder that business leaders are less than enthusiastic about opportunities for growth?

I can imagine the conversations that are taking place around most board-rooms. When under pressure the usual approach is to look at budgets and immediately identify where costs can be cut. And the usual suspects are discretionary spend from training and development, travel and expenses, considering  pay cuts and wage freeze and reducing marketing spend.

Whatever actions we decide upon, one thing I highly recommend is that you engage your team with the challenge facing you.

Through opening up a dialogue about the challenging time your business may be facing will enable you to ensure that your team:

• Understand the decisions you are making and the reasons for them
• Will be able to identify what these changes mean for them and their roles
• Will be better equipped to explain any changes to clients or business partners
• And will undoubtedly be able to share ideas and suggestions they have for managing through tough times.

Engagement of your people at times of uncertainty is critical - and I’m not just talking about delivering a message of the actions you are planning to take as this runs the risk of disengaging your people, demotivating them and in fact even run the risk of losing your best and brightest talent.

Today I met with one of my coaching clients - a high potential marketing leader in a global company - and he opened the conversation sharing with me that he was considering leaving the organisation.
You see only last week he had been called into a meeting with his senior executive team who outlined that as their operating unit is underperforming, that everyone would be rated as underperforming this year in the year end appraisal.

My client had delivered great performance within his own team and function, but the overall collective performance of the business unit was way off mark and had not met the annual plan.

His immediate reaction was to leave the organisation as he felt that his personal contribution was not being recognised and even worse in his eyes was being rated as underperfoming which in the context of this organisation was to say farewell to any chance of job moves in the future.

When he had reflected on the message from the executive team and he thought about what he would do if this were his business, he completely understood the decision and why is was being made at a rational level. However his emotional connectiveness to the employer brand was severely impacted.

This high potential marketing leader who has significant influence with his team and his colleagues had been left disengaged and demotivated.

We talked through his strategy for moving forward and specifically for the next 180 days as he starts the new financial year. We explored how he might engage his own team and his internal stakeholders and clients in the challenging agenda for the year ahead. And we also talked through how he needs to demonstrate resilience through adversity - the actions we are seen to take and how we are seen to behave have an impact on other peoples experience of our personal brand as a leader.

At the end of our time together he had a robust plan of action and I think it’s unlikely this high potential leader will leave his organisation in the short term.

He had someone to turn to and talk through his personal and professional strategy with, but that’s not the case for most high potential leaders.

The conversation left me wondering what conversations are taking place in the workplace today that are undermining the strength of powerful employer brands, the psychological contract and talent strategies that have been crafted and developed by HR Directors and Heads of Talent Management.

Every connection, every communication, every conversation we have with our people can strengthen or destroy your employer brand. And at times of uncertainty or recession the risk of losing our best people despite golden handcuffs is never greater.

And as most businesses today are highly dependent on hiring and retaining great talent as a key strategy to winning in an ever increasingly complex and competitive world, my guess is that the organisations who will ride the recession with be those who understand and actively engage their people.

What examples have you seen where great employee engagement strategies have been put in place to help company’s ride the recession?

© Krishna De, 2008. All rights reserved.

About the author: Krishna De is an employer branding and personal branding strategist and is considered to be one of Europe’s leading brand engagement and social media experts. You will find more of Krishna’s articles and podcasts at her award winning business blog Biz Growth News (http://www.bizgrowthnews.com/). You’ll also find her networking online at Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter – so why not connect with her online today!