Geldards recently held EO roundtable events for trustee directors in Cardiff and Narberth. Below are the key learning points that arose from the sessions.

All EOTs are different and some points covered may be more relevant to your company than others.

Be consistent with the information

Consistency means both the timing and also the information or details shared with the staff. Quarterly information bulletins are most common as they can smooth out some results.

It is also important to report both good and bad news, as honesty in the messaging is paramount. Most employees will know if a business is struggling due to a lack of work.

Ensure relevance to the business

What do your staff need to know and what makes sense for your staff? Common metrics shared by EO businesses include turnover, profitability, profit margins and client wins. Your business may have some specific metrics for your business or your sector.

Understandable for the staff

It is no good just giving the staff a set of accounts (unless you are an accountancy firm). Good communication can involve the use of graphics (bar charts or something similar) and comparisons to previous years which can be particularly important for cyclical businesses to show consistency.

We suggest explaining downturns and what is being done to rectify issues to avoid employees being unduly worried.

You may wish to encourage financial literacy. A professional services business may be different from a factory in terms of employees’ understanding of information.

Different levels of information

You may provide a summary or highlighted selection of information for employees. The EOT trustee board would probably expect more detail to fulfill their role of oversight of the trading company operation.

In both cases you can emphasise confidentiality where relevant, however, with all information, the more people who know the more likely the information will leak out. We recommend telling employees information that you would be happy to see published in the trade press.

It is important to ensure that sharing the information creates a positive impact (even if there is some bad news). You should avoid highlighting issues for one area of the business which can be divisive and demotivating (and thereby avoid a “blame” culture).

Sharing information should lead to a two-way communication flow

A management team should encourage feedback and questions from staff and make it easy for staff to ask questions. Answers should be timely and clear, and management should explain why things cannot be changed rather than giving a straight “No” as an answer. In particular, it is important and empowering to celebrate changes as a result of staff feedback.

A couple of the attendees had taken time to explain the costs of the business with a pie chart for employees to guess the different costs (salaries, rent, heating and light, new machinery, repairs and maintenance etc). Having a better idea of where the money is spent allows employees to think about potential savings, or at the very least, switch off the lights when they leave a room.

Ultimate aim

The rationale for sharing information is to encourage change and a move in mindset from staff being “employees” to “employee owners”. The management team has to accept that a small proportion of the workforce with not embrace change and therefore should concentrate their efforts on the majority who are open to change.

If you would like to join us at future EO roundtable events please contact Andrew Evans or our Marketing team. The next sessions in Cardiff and Narberth will be on managing the relationship between the trustee board and the management board.