With everyone counting down the days until 2020 ends, leading analysts say companies need to start 2021 with a clear, compelling message to employees. Workers want the new year to go better than the tumultuous one prior, and it’s up to employers to communicate how.
The messaging will be different for every enterprise, but they will all share the challenge of conveying their plans and vision to the entire staff — frontline workforce included. A memo won’t cut it, and employees hungry for stability need as much information as possible and answers to their individual questions. Like COVID-19 itself, the internal communication strategy around the recovery will be unprecedented.
Internal communication tools have helped many companies weather 2020 — perhaps leading to the number of frontline managers who believe a communication gap exists in their organizations falling from 58% to 25%, according to a Workplace by Facebook survey. However, 91% of headquarters’ managers communicated through email during the pandemic compared to around 25% of managers on the frontlines, suggesting that though communications were up, information didn’t necessarily move efficiently.
This was a common refrain throughout 2020. Previously untested internal communication tools revealed they couldn’t move fast or flexibly enough to keep the frontline workers across organizations — those most in need of information yet most isolated from decision makers — up to date. Lacking a comprehensive communication platform that extends from top to bottom, the frontline workforce was left out of the loop.
