Many companies are going through very difficult times. Orders and revenues are down and it’s been that way for a couple of years. Unhappily, the near future doesn’t look much better.

According to a recent article in the Institute of Management Journal, one business owner took a hard look at the economy’s impact on his business and decided that he had to become a very active and engaged leader to maintain what he felt were the keys to surviving:
Employee loyalty and trust.

• Play it straight with employees. Openness and honesty prepare and motivate people to follow decisions that require them to change. Employees need to understand the business conditions that influence your staffing, supplier and customer decisions.
• Make sure all of your employees know what you expect of them and that their value will be measured to those expectations. Define the cheerleading fuzzies. What does working “smarter and leaner” really mean to each individual?
• Don’t accept substandard performance. Ignoring marginal work is guaranteed to create ill will with the people doing good work.
• Make sure the entire organization pays attention to cost. Demonstrate the bottom-line impact of cost cutting and value-added efforts. Track and post business performance data. Make sure employees know and care about the impact of your decisions.
• Redouble your efforts to reward behaviors that you value or define your culture. You may not be able to give a pay raise but you can define, recognize and reward current behavior that will get you a better future. Make a list of what you want to see happen. Then, decide what you’re going to do about it when it does happen.
• Never, ever, take employee loyalty for granted. It’s precious and fragile. It’s hard work to get loyalty but it can transcend other issues when times are tough.

   One final thought in the article dealt with layoffs. Avoid layoffs if at all possible. The payoff will be employee loyalty and a company prepared to maximize the “good times.”.