Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

Microsoft already had a public relations crisis on its hands with Thursday's news that it was laying off 18,000 employees. That's 14 percent of its workforce, and the biggest batch of job cuts in the company's nearly 40-year history.

How it's communicating those layoffs to employees doesn't seem to be helping matters. Microsoft published the email from Stephen Elop, head of Microsoft's devices unit, to about 12,500 laid-off employees. The lion's share of the employees who are losing jobs come from his department.

The memo begins, "Hello there," ends with "Regards," and is loaded with business jargon. Terms such as "financial envelope," "business continuity," and "right-size our manufacturing operations" are peppered throughout. Worse, it barely makes clear that its recipients have been discharged. It's mostly about the company's new strategy to make and sell Windows phones, which wouldn't seem a primary concern for people who no longer work for Microsoft....

Shel Holtz examines the challenge of communicating layoffs to employees and its impact on company reputation and other key audiences.

the social media era makes it even more difficult to manage information..

Learn why P&G adopting digital is a battle that's going nowhere...

...When I wrote about their layoffs last year, I cautioned P&G (because they were obviously reading my blog article) that:

- Digital media is not free

- Not all advertising is inherently bad

- Not all digital advertising is inherently effective.

Apparently, the words of warning did not resonate. This week, Business Insider reported that CEO Bob McDonald actually ended up cutting 6,250 jobs as part of his cost-savings program -- so my 1,600 figure last year fell short of reality -- and that part of that program included "using more social media like Facebook and Google, which deliver 'free' ad impressions."... 

Like many communications professionals, I am sure I’m not alone in wondering what internal communication activities have been taking place at supermarket giant Tesco in the wake of the horsemeat story.

What have they told store colleagues? Are the internal and external messages aligned? How are employees feeling about the headlines?