I am often sceptical of newspaper supplements as just ending up as train floor fodder but yesterday’s Barclays sponsored guide called “The Road to Recovery: A blueprint for business” had some interesting stuff in it. 

A piece by Stefan Stern (of whom I am a big fan) caught my eye as it focused on boosting morale following corporate upheaval.  There are few companies who haven’t seen some sort of change in the past 2 years be it growth in new areas, changes in management or for the more unlucky folks, redundancies and closures. 

One of the main areas of management that has always fascinated me is how to build and maintain a team ethic as you business grows and changes and Stefan provided some interesting pointers that can be adapted to suit both the PR industry and the economy we are in right now.

• Structure your strategy around (re)building and (re)assuring
• Make employees proud of where they work
• Clever and creative people want fun at work
• Stamp out gloomy environments
• Don’t change the message/goals before they have really got through to staff
• Be honest and straight talking
• Be calm, don’t panic and handle situations with openness and backbone
• Get involved, don’t run the business from the spreadsheets: get out and meet staff and clients
• Don’t apologise for decisions, explain why they are necessary and stand by them

Cross posted with my employer’s blog