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In this episode, Heather sits down to discuss the recent news of the Better.com CEO laying off hundreds of employees through a 3-minute Zoom call. This has made headline news – and not for good reason. This CEO acted in the complete opposite of what we encourage on this podcast and showed absolutely no care. Let’s break it down.
Key Takeaways:
- Leaders need to be held accountable for their actions
- Lay-offs are often necessary – but they can be done with care
- A lay-off should be about the employees and not about the leaders’ guilty conscience
- Leaders and managers are in control of how they make their people feel
- Mass negative news, such as a lay-off, should be done with care
In just three minutes, one leader changed the entire trajectory of all of those 900 employees and their families' lives. - Heather R Younger #leadershipwithheart Share on X
Heather R Younger is an experienced keynote speaker, two-time author, and the CEO and Founder of Employee Fanatix, a leading employee engagement, leadership development, and DEI consulting firm, where she is on a mission to help leaders understand the power they possess to ensure people feel valued at work.
Known as The Employee WhispererTM, Heather harnesses humor, warmth, and an instant relatability to engage and uplift audiences and inspire them into action.
Rooted in her belief that employees aren’t just numbers on the payroll but human beings with ideas that matter, Heather’s talks and workshops are dedicated to helping teams, leaders, and organizations shine by improving how they listen to, communicate with, and empower employees on their journey to Caring Leadership.
Leading without Care
Better.com CEO recently laid off hundreds of employees via a 3-minute Zoom call. He made the call more about him stating, “last time I had to do this I cried” is a very robotic way. Those are the wrong words to use when you are changing the trajectory of your employees and their families’ lives. Instead of making it about himself, he should have focused on his people and how they were feeling. In the video, you can hear how heartbroken this employee is to hear about the news – but he didn’t think about that. He made the call about himself with little regard as to how he was impacting lives. Since then he has apologized and taken a leave of absence – but how genuine is his apology? It doesn’t seem very genuine to me.
199: Leaders with Heart Don’t Cause PTSD Share on X
As leaders, we need to be vulnerable enough to apologize when we've done something wrong. - Heather R Younger #leadershipwithheart Share on X
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