Healing the Wounds: Overcoming the Trauma of Layoffs and Revitalizing Downsized Organizations

7.2. Redundant Communication Is Essential

Communication is a level 1 process. Layoff survivors have an unquenchable thirst for information, before, during, and after reductions. Their need leaps from the pages of data in Chapters Four and Five. It is impossible for managers to overcommunicate during layoffs. Survivors suck up data like desert sand absorbs water. They are information junkies. If they do not get needed information, they go through withdrawal and then guess at what's going on and develop theories, often erroneous, based on fragments of information. If you are a layoff planner, it is extremely important for you to respond to this need. Flood the system with information—oral, written, formal, informal, verbal, and nonverbal; up, ...