The cost to a company of correcting misinformation is 10 X that of the time and effort spent to proactively communicate to your workers.
Why does misinformation spread?
Results from a recent Twitter study suggest that false news spreads faster and more widely than the truth.
And with any time of uncertainty, change or disruption, this is more likely to occur. You just need to look on industry groups on social media to see which companies are not communicating basic things with their workforce, as they are publicly reaching out to get the answers they need, which often may not be correct.
Some common reasons why misinformation spreads include:
1.To fill the vacuum of information – if teams haven’t been proactive with the information
employees want, speculation and rumor will fill the vacuum.
2.To show resistance –employees in conflict with a situation at work will display this through
their comments.
3.To share anxiety or concerns - in times of change, employees express their feelings openly to
seek the comfort of like-minded opinions.
What are the effects of misinformation on business?
1.Stirring up negative sentiment.
2.Undermining trust in leadership.
3.Reducing business productivity.
4.Increase in turnover.
5.Incidents & injury.
How to avoid this?
Multiple channels of consistent communication on a medium your workforce will see & can understand.
Are the channels your using correct for the information?
1.Your sending emails- however your workforce (like mining) are non desk based so don’t access emails.
2.Communication is verbally delivered all at once (EG a prestart) relying on users memory, and no ability to go back or fully understand for other language speaking personal. This also can cause inconsistency in messaging from the person re delivering the news.
3.You’re posting all your company updates on linked-in and social media, how many of your workforce are actually on LinkedIn and follow the company and will actually see the message? Not many.
4.You have rolled out coms app before, and no one really used it? That’s probably because all it does is coms, and not everyone is motivated by the same things to take immediate action and get on board with systems.
5.That’s why we are multi feature, so workers are personally motivated to download the App, and have what they need, when they need it.
