Going beyond the straight talk for work
FACE TO FACE Townhall meetings let corporates get a first-hand feel of employee priorities, questions and concerns. It is nowadays considered to be quite beneficial
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s landmark townhall meeting with Mark Zuckerberg at Facebook’s headquarters recently had many memorable moments. While Modi spoke of his personal interest in social media as “my curiosity towards technology,” Zuckerberg narrated a littleknown incident about his guru, the late Apple CEO Steve Jobs, advising him to make a spiritual journey to India and visit a temple there.
It was a landmark, lively 50-minute interaction between the leader of the world’s largest democracy and the greatest internet entrepreneur, something that Facebook employees are not likely to forget easily. For organisations as well as employees, townhalls, thus, are great opportunities to meet up with or hear out well-known personalities.
Trends indicate that organisations are prioritising invitations to celebrities to visit their offices and interact and engage with their employees. The idea is that they can teach both business leaders and employees a thing or two about how to achieve success and drive results.
The Facebook townhall served numerous purposes – it projected Modi as a role model to various leaders. It instilled confidence among Indians, projected their country as digital India – progressive and not underdeveloped.
Townhalls initially were meant to be informal engagement platforms with local communities in New England. Today, they are widely used by top management to reach out to employees, understand their moods, impediments to innovation, their aspirations and the issues that bother them. Companies also organise such events to communicate their vision, new plans and strategies face-to-face, in real time, to employees.
Typically in large organisations where employees rarely get to see or hear the CEO/MD, townhalls are occasions for discussing the road ahead. This also helps employees link their work to the larger ambition of the organisation. Some townhalls are also recognition forums where achievers are recognised and lauded in front of a large employee gathering, says Kamal Karanth, MD, Kelly Services and KellyOCG, India.
Townhalls are also an important source of feedback, where employees provide their thoughts in real-time. They help build culture from the top with leadership involvement, and also provide the platform to give wide publicity to changes that have resulted from feedback. The topics covered at townhalls are varied – communicating important changes, charting the strategy for the organisation and business units, addressing employee concerns and making announcements.
According to Sameer Wadhawan, vice president, HR, Coca-Cola India and South West Asia, townhalls promote “employee connections” versus some other methods of employee engagements, which generally promote “employee communication.” When organised in large meeting rooms or cafeteria or recreation rooms, townhalls bring about an element of “community connect.”
Not just a message dissemination platform, they involve two-way communication and promote employee bonding and camaraderie. Also, townhalls being the equivalent of a community set-up in a corporate environment, employees are motivated to ask questions on such occasions which they would otherwise not ask in a one-to-one set-up, Wadhawan says. Townhall formats vary at Coca-Cola India and South West Asia – the usual once-a-quarter meeting with senior leaders and CEO and other events to promote themes, which can involve achievers or celebrities.
The value of these townhalls is tremendous as they help to create a level of positivity and energy around organisational priorities.
Besides, people talk to each other, create cross team conversations and relationships that are very important in this highly matrixed world, says Kameshwari Rao, vice president, people strategy, Sapient India. About the various formats at Tata Steel, Suresh Dutt Tripathi, vice president, HRM, says MD Online is held on the first day of every month when everybody gets connected from all locations, from South Asia to Jamshedpur.
SWATI or Steel Women’s Aspirational Team Initiative invites women employees to an open session where issues pertaining to women’s leadership are discussed and sensitisation sessions are held.
Celebrities visit the company for its Window on the World session as the objective is to foster, learn and inspire employees. So far, the company has invited the Army chief, actors and even ISRO scientists to address its employees.