The Morale of the Story lists ways to keep team morale up in a business setting. Communication combats helplessness:
When a Boston design firm went through some tough times a few years ago, resentment between the management and the workforce grew. At a board meeting, executives expressed their frustration that no one was staying late and making that extra effort to do projects better, faster, cheaper.But management had never spelled out the peril the company was in or revealed a plan for dealing with it. They didn’t want to frighten employees. In the absence of information, employees thought either that their managers couldn’t see the writing on the wall (so they were stupid) or that they did see it and were making secret plans for dealing with it (so they were sinister). Another mutually assured stalemate.
By contrast, the CEO of a furniture company successfully steered his employees through the trauma of being acquired with weekly, sometimes even twice weekly, updates. He’d gather everyone in the lunchroom and simply explain, this is where we are in the negotiations and this is where we’re going. Why was he so successful? Because what he said would happen did happen. Each time he outlined a future that came true, he demonstrated his own competence and reinforced trust.