Tips for strong internal communication during corona

With a crisis descending on the country and the rest of the world, unrest is rising at many companies. The COVID-19 virus brings more than health measures alone and the country is in a light lockdown. The majority of people are working from home, work is at a standstill and much is unclear. Questions such as ‘When should I report sick?’ or ‘What is the home working policy?’ are being asked all around. Your HR, spokesperson or crisis team has to answer every question, and to avoid uncertainty you want this to happen as fast as possible. Read how you can be a stable factor in times of enormous unrest.

The importance of digitalisation has nowhere come to the fore so prominently as during the crisis situation the Corona virus brings with it. Companies that had their eye on short-term goals will run into problems that can easily be reduced or even resolved with the help of digitalisation. Offering suitable tools to your staff will help with your current challenges. Find the most important tips here.

1. Offer certainty in uncertain times

‘When can I come back to the office?’ or ‘Can I take leave?’ are questions every organisation recognises. When your employees have to wait a long time for an answer to these questions, this causes uncertainty. Your staff hear news from various corners and want to know what the consequences are for the organisation. Do you not catch these questions straight away? Then uncertainty and stress come round the corner.

What you of course want to avoid as an organisation is the circulation of second-hand information. A colleague hears something from HR, and passes this on among other colleagues before this fact has even been confirmed. This brings misunderstandings to the fore and you create even more uncertainty in an already uncertain situation. To avoid this you want to set up one information point, not several channels or several people. That way you avoid fragmented information provision. Thanks to an automated approach you assure an immediate and adequate answer for your staff because the Conversational Assistant always keeps the same tone of voice.

2. Always stay reachable

Your crisis team does not work day and night. Your staff's questions do not stop after 6 o'clock, though. On top of that, your crisis team can be hard to reach because of an overwhelming number of questions, which leaves your staff stuck with their questions.

With a Conversational Assistant you are there for your staff outside working hours too. Your Conversational Assistant can hold several conversations at once, at any moment of the day. That way nobody has to wait for the latest developments and you can simply chat whenever you need to. Avoid stress and waiting times this way, and create certainty on the work floor.

3. Give the most recent information at one central point

An FAQ, a crisis campaign and a spreadsheet all have to be supplied with the latest developments. This information can differ by the day. Three days ago we were all sitting on a terrace en masse, which is now no longer open. To prevent ‘updating’ this information becoming a full day's work, you can make use of a tool that processes this information easily and distributes it automatically on all channels. Easily add new information and content to your Conversational Assistant; it processes it automatically and has access to the same information on all the channels it is active on. That way you avoid miscommunication, and you stand ready with the latest news.

4. Create the best home working environment

Working from home is different for everyone. One person is happy with some quality time around the house; another has no focus and does not have access to the right tools. A customer service agent cannot put his/her desk phone at home, for example. Limited access to tools can lead to a delayed or even halted work process.

For both your service staff and your regular staff, it is important that they are supplied with the right tools. A call centre employee working from home may sound difficult. With the right technology, though, you make sure these staff are there for customers from home too.

5. Lower the workload

A reduction in resources combined with an influx of customer questions causes stress. The way of communicating can help with conveying the right message and reduces stress on the (home) work floor.

By automating the first-line customer questions you enormously lower the pressure on your staff and on top of that you make the work more enjoyable too. A Conversational Assistant deals with questions automatically and offers visitors guidance to the right place. Thanks to artificial intelligence the Assistant learns to recognise question variations and so handles repetitive matters that would normally end up with your human staff. You bring in this Conversational Assistant by entering your current policy and FAQs. Do you have no time for this? Then take a look at Watermelon's plug-in Conversational Assistants.

Unless companies help each other and effective action is taken, organisations will come to a standstill. On top of that, a Conversational platform can offer support in various ways in busy times. The crisis communication around the virus brings several complications with it; let Watermelon support you.

Want to know more?

Thanks to a Conversational Assistant you lower the workload, increase your availability, are there for your team 24/7 and are up to date with the latest developments. Getting your team ready to work from home is not necessary with a Conversational Assistant; with Watermelon's all-in-one dashboard you are immediately there for both your staff and your customers. Would you like to know more about how to deploy chatbots successfully? Download the free whitepaper by clicking the button below!