Don McKenzie has more than 600 employees in four offices and he spends a third of his time with customers. He’s learned the time you have in front of employees is valuable for clear and concise conversation.
“I think in today’s economic environment and today’s marketplace, having that level of very clear communication is critical,” says McKenzie, president and CEO of Direct Group, a direct marketing solutions provider.
You have to set a tone based on facts and the current marketplace. And you have to find an effective format to get your message to all employees.
McKenzie uses town-hall meetings to do just that. He tries to reach his employees quarterly, if not more, to keep a pulse on the organization and receive pertinent feedback.
The important aspects of a town-hall meeting are involving all employees in the conversation and making it just that, a conversation.
Smart Business spoke with McKenzie about how to use town-hall meetings for your benefit and the benefit of your employees.
Make yourself visible. It’s very important for CEOs today, and in the future, to be very visible, to be articulating the company’s mission, to articulate the company’s strategy, not only to their employee base but also to clients and vendors.
(You do that by) getting out of your office. I have a lot of town-hall meetings. Some of the town-hall sessions could have 10 or 15 employees, (or they) could have 20 to 25, but really no more than 20 to 25.
You want them to be more intimate. You want a good give-and-take dialogue so that way you’re articulating what’s going on in the business, both the opportunities and the challenges. You’re asking questions, and you’re asking for candid feedback, not just all good news but what are some of the challenges.
I think town-hall meetings are better to do in person than via video or telephone conference. The right way, I think, is to just be very visible, personally, and not only be a communicator but also be a very good listener and put that learning into practice.
Include everyone in the conversation. Everyone is invited. We do all employees, all shifts, all days, and we do it on their schedule. For example, we have town-hall meetings during the third shift. We make sure we’re meeting them on their shifts and not asking them to come in early or stay late.
We certainly want to have departments together. For example, there are certain questions and challenges that are relevant to customer service that might not be relevant to inventory. So we certainly want to have the town-hall meetings be tailored to the audience or the department or the division.
Then, we ask people to sign up for them. For example, if there’s 50 people in one department, then we’ll have a signup roster, and we’ll have several hours in a row of meetings so they can get to one or two or three or four depending upon their location.
