Workhuman Makes its Mission-Critical Life Events and Conversations Products Available to all Organizations in Response to COVID-19 Crisis

By HRTech News Desk Last updated Apr 1, 2020

Company gives the world free human-connection software to address social isolation during global pandemic

Workhuman^®, a leading provider of social recognition platforms, today announced it is making special editions of Life Events^® and Conversations^® products free until March 2021 to help mitigate isolation during the COVID-19 disruption. Human moments, including those anchored in an office environment and those focused on the family, don’t stop during times of crisis. Impromptu conversations about baby shower gifts and birthday card signatures, among others, now shift to an online format, but still continue.

According to a Workhuman/SHRM report, when employees are very/somewhat satisfied with the celebration of life events, they are nearly 2x as likely to agree their company is a good place to work. Having a forum to celebrate and illuminate the good happening in an employee’s life becomes more vital as everyone navigates to this new way of working.

“The world’s workforce is in social despair due to the coronavirus pandemic, and it’s more important than ever that business leaders are creating and maintaining human connections with their entire workforce,” said Eric Mosley, CEO of Workhuman. “Humanity loves company and today’s distributed and isolated workforces are presenting a major challenge to business leaders when it comes to maintaining a strong company culture and keeping employees engaged. It’s incredibly important that employee lives are being recognized and celebrated, gratitude and optimism is being shared, and managers have an ongoing cadence of check-ins with their people. It is our hope that these mission-critical tools can help organizations connect their people during these unprecedented times.”

Life Events and Conversations are part of Workhuman^® Cloud, a suite of human-centered products designed to drive social and human connections across people and teams, which is more important than ever before. The software platform motivates employees to establish and deepen relationships and build trust, thus fostering greater innovation, creativity, and collaboration. Workhuman Cloud is used by more than 4.5 million people around the world, at companies such as Cisco, LinkedIn, and Procter & Gamble.

Available now:

Life Events – Strengthen team bonds, especially in today’s dispersed working environment, to celebrate life-affirming events, such as weddings, new babies, human acts of kindness and much needed well-wishes. Recognize and celebrate that life continues during times of crisis. Enlist the crowd through social support to boost organizational morale and belonging.

Conversations – Facilitate remote connections through scheduled check-ins with managers and peers to ensure that teams connect often to navigate the uncertainty. Stay aligned on fluid priorities and short-term goals.

Supporting quotes:

“The pandemic has forced physical isolation for employees around the world. Business and HR leaders have an opportunity to step up to help prevent social isolation as well. Products, such as Workhuman Cloud, that give employees a sense of connection, belonging, and progress while delivering an emotional impact can help reinforce that we are all in this together. There is no better time than now to recognize the humanity in all of us,” said Stacia Garr, co-founder and principal analyst at RedThread Research.

“We are living in a moment where the future of work has become the “now of work” overnight. The “now of work” requires organizations to abolish their old HR processes and practices and shift to a more human approach to driving meaningful social interactions at work. The time to do this is based on the times we are living in; the difference between establishing and maintaining these human connections now vs. later may truly be the lifeline for small to mid-sized organizations around the world,” said Jason Averbook, leading analyst, thought leader, and CEO and Co-Founder of Leapgen.

Additional data points:

Three out of five organizations (60 percent) are involved in helping employees celebrate life events, and about one-third (32 percent) leave it up to employees/teams/ departments to decide how or whether to celebrate, according to a 2018 SHRM/Workhuman employee recognition report.
When employees have a greater sense of connection, organizations could realize 12 percent higher profit, 7 percent more engaged customers, and 46 percent fewer safety incidents, according to Gallup “State of the American Workplace, 2017”.
Employees who have a simple regular check in with their manager (on any topic) are more than twice as likely to trust and respect their manager and five times less likely to be disengaged, according to Workhuman’s research “The Future of Work is Human”.

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