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....

The vultures have been circling Groupon founder and CEO Andrew Mason for a while now. Today, they swooped in. With the company trading around a quarter of its IPO price and its future cloudy at best, the board officially gave Mason the boot and announced a search or a new chief executive. 

Mason, meanwhile, is going to fat camp. 

Or so he says in an amazingly self-effacing and candid goodbye letter he tweeted out to Groupon's employees (Groupon PR also confirmed it was real. Can't be too careful.). "I was fired today," Mason writes. "If you're wondering why...you haven't been paying attention." The ex-CEO then precedes to graciously take responsibility for Groupon's recent travails, before wishing his former work force the best. 

Say what you will about the man's business acumen, at least he's self aware....

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?

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."... 

The hyper-local news website network issued an internal memo on Friday touting good news to come. On Monday, heads rolled and some offices were shuttered.

Imagine you're sitting at your desk at work on a Friday afternoon. You're shocked to receive an email stating that the company's CEO is resigning, but the chairman sends a reassuring follow-up email stating that some positive retooling is coming.

Then, on Monday, you and a lot of the other people in your office are laid off—with no severance pay.

It sounds outlandish, but that's exactly what happened to employees at Daily Voice, a network of hyper-local news websites in the Northeastern United States. According to Gawker, employees were told Monday the company would shutter 11 bureaus in Massachusetts. Many of the most experienced employees in its Connecticut and New York offices received layoff notices. Those sites will continue running with smaller staffs....

Even with Citigroup’s huge job cut plans announced Wednesday, Hewlett-Packard Co (NYSE:HPQ) remains the leader in corporate job cuts from U.S.-based companies in 2012, according to data from Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. Back in May, the ailing Palo Alto, Calif.-based tech giant said it would cut 27,000 jobs to save up to $3.5 billion. H-P contributed to May being the peak month in 2012 for job-cut announcements with more than 61,000 and pointed to computer companies as one of the most vulnerable industries of the year. Shares of H-P are down more than 45% for the year....

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..