 |
|
|
|||||
My plane had just landed. I was anxious to get to the office after the departure of our team leader, a reduction in force culling hundreds of jobs just days before, and an organizational move to an unfamiliar part of the enterprise. As my teams senior ranking member, I needed to help process everything together. I turned on my phone to a deluge of texts. Please call as soon as possible, my colleague wrote. Is everything okay? I responded. No, she replied. I called her as the plane taxied my crammed flight to the gate. Priya, she said, Ashley died. She took her own life. The words echoed in my headstrange sounds that made no sense and didnt feel real. Ashley had been a valued member of the team, a well-loved and developing leader whose deep empathy, perpetual curiosity, and strong work ethic were constant reminders of the nature and value of our role within the company. I didnt quite believe what I was hearing. Sobbing from the other side of the line pulled me back. I instantly donned the mantle of doctor. I had to help my friends and colleagues through thisand separate my own emotion from what needed to be done. It was going to be my job to tell the rest of my team. As an emergency physician, I was the one who told people their loved ones had died. I never expected to do the same in corporate America. And despite working for a healthcare company, Id soon learn Id have to do it with little support. The systems I was used to in the hospital were not in place here. Every Companys Duty We live in volatile times. Suicide rates in the U.S. spiked 36% over the past two decades, with nearly 50,000 deaths in 2023 alone. Across the country, job stability is tenuous, risking employer health insurance coverage. Mental health services are beyond capacity. Amid billions slashed in mental health funding and threats to Medicaid coverage, the situation will likely worsen. These tragedies impact the workforce, though precisely how depends on the level and caliber of systems-level organization and preparedness. Even in healthcare companies, clinical expertise and informed leadership can be systemically lacking. When I ran into this absence of coordinated systems, I used skills honed in the emergency departmentthrough treating gunshots, heart attacks, and COVID-19to help my team. But what if corporate America turned lessons from emergency medicine into a systems-level approach to suicide? We might turn tragedy into psychological safetyimproving employee loyalty, productivity, and longevityto the benefit of the business. Heres how. 1. Build a Coordinated Team and Established Process When a patient presents to the emergency department in a critical state, the team springs into action. The doctor, nurses, and emergency techs focus on the patient, while security, social work, and pastoral care workers support loved ones. In crises, everyone has a role. Under high-pressure circumstances, a single decision could result in death. Protocols such as American Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) and American Trauma Life Support (ATLS) standardize our approaches and maximize opportunity for survival. Large companies should adopt crisis management protocols describing who and how theyll support employees after suicide and other workplace traumas, instead of avoiding such in hope that suicide would be a rare event. Delineating processes, roles, and responsibilities mitigates variation and disorganization while enabling prompt response and engagement. Thats fundamental because failing to quickly address a suicide can increase misinformation, distrust, and anxiety. 2. Communicate Immediately and Clearly After communicating with her family, I wanted to tell my team about Ashley face-to-face, just as I would in the emergency department. I also wanted to secure resources should anyone need support. On the cab ride from the airport, I engaged our human resources team and asked for crisis counseling on-site. I reserved a private space on campus for the entire team to gather. Out of respect and dignity not only for Ashley but also for the team as a whole, it was critical that the news was shared in a safe space from a trusted source. Hearing such through the rumor mill would undermine the honor I held central to the process. Human resources teams and leaders should model dignity and respectand not be the source of word-of-mouth spread. Death-telling is an evidence-driven process that includes a few key actions: gathering loved ones together, providing resources, and meeting people where they are, which means immediately setting context, using clear words such as died, and allowing time and space to process the information. A few hours after I got to the office, it was time. Given the recent reduction in force, I had to stave off my teams top-of-mind fear. First, I said, our jobs are secure. Then I told them Ashley had died. We dont know all the details, I said, but we know she died by suicide. I fell silent, giving space for the shock and emotion that followed, while my own heart broke for everyone. As a close-knit team, sadness shrouded all of us, settling into the room. The air felt heavier. The silence was replaced by gasps and tears. After some time, I made a simple promise: Im here for anything you need. Well get through this together. 3. Provide Visible and Tangible Support Suicide is a contagion. Exposure may increase the risk of suicidal thoughts, behaviors, and depression. In the aftermath, companies typically provide information about employee assistance programs or counseling services to help people cope with grief. But merely pointing to resources rather than providing them can make the people processing shock feel overwhelmed. They may perceive it as absent support. Postvention is a process designed to quash the contagion. It alleviates the effects of stress, helping survivors through immediate, short-term, and long-term responses. Visible and strong workplace leadership, with a willingness to discuss and serve as an ongoing resource, is effective in postvention efforts. But when leaders neither acknowledge nor offer safety following the suicide of an employee, that void can feel dehumanizing and propagate stigma. If an organization cannot talk about suicide, experts have noted, it cannot properly support those impacted by it. Silence from leaders and HR can feel deafeningfurther undermining survivors sense of psychological safety and spurring feelings of isolation and neglect. Leaders who support collective mourning, through memorials or gathering events, connect people while dispelling stigma. 4. Help Managers Through It As we began grieving, I did everything I could to give the team space and permission to care for themselves. I cleared noncritical work and nonessential meetings and absorbed parts of their workload. As a physician, I knew each person would have different needs, based on their beliefs, cultural norms, and behaviors. High-pressure postventions usually fall to direct managers, who often have minimal to no training. They may overlook their own trauma and grieving process while tending to the needs of the team and the business. While strict hierarchical structures pervade corporate culture, leaders, including those in HR, should break rank amid crises. They should reach out beyond their direct reports to support the larger team. The better trained and available HR leaders are, the more they can alleviate the pressures on any one manager. 5. Debrief, Learn, and Improve Organized debriefings with leaders to review processes, execution, and opportunities for improvement are standard practice in medicine and for first responders. This not only allows for continuous quality improvement, but also provides an opportunity for various members to voice their personal experiences. Time and space from an acute event brings clarity and refinement. Following the suicide of a colleague, an organized debriefing supports the long-term aspect of the postvention. This is a collaborative exercise, anchored in safety and humility and based in learning and a drive to improve. Through honest feedback and critical evaluation, processes can be honed and the company can benefit as a whole. Helping Employees Heal From Crisis At a time when systems across the U.S. appear to be crumbling, corporate America has a valuable opportunity to assimilate humanity and empathy. Through processes and protocols, organizations can navigate crises by nurturing compassion, vulnerability, and shared healing. Thats essential to employee wellnesswhich is, in turn, essential to engagement and productivity. But systems cant solve everything. Medicines most refined processes cant prevent the guilt that plagues most survivors of suicide. I still struggle with the questions. Had I seen Ashley in the emergency department rather than the workplace, could I have spotted a warning sign and intervened? Had I fully understood how deeply the reorganization disrupted her sense of safety, what might I have done to mitigate it? Ill never have all the answers. I have only the lessons learned from a tragedy no leader wants to endure but for which every leader must prepare. Ashley left an indelible mark on all of us, both in life and in her absence. The shock and grief may never be gone, and a disappointment in company culture may linger. But our team got through the crisis togetherjust as Id promised.
Category:
E-Commerce
With the Atlantic hurricane season underway and another record-hot summer ahead, corporate America is entering its most volatile stretch of the year. From tariffs to extreme weather, todays risks are hitting supply chains, markets, and investor confidence. The environment turns every natural or man-made crisis into a business liability. If youre a CEO, board member, or C-suite leader, this is your wake-up call and your moment to prepare. To help, we offer a warning of an emerging threat to be ready for: misinformation. Recent leadership shifts, political interference, and funding uncertainty have exposed cracks in the countrys crisis response infrastructure. If government systems cant keep up with the pace of crisis this year and beyond, businesses cant afford to wait. And misinformation cannot go unchecked or ignored. A new front has opened that plays out on the digital battlefield of public perception, where misinformation spreads faster than facts. Lies are sensational, loud, and sticky. The truth? Its often slower and more complexand yes, sometimes boring. That imbalance is where real damage happens. The New Crisis Reality In any crisiswhether a public health emergency, cyberattack, or natural disastercommunication is as vital as the response itself. In todays hyperpolarized landscape, weve already seen the consequences of misinformation, which offer a sobering preview of whats ahead. During the 2023 train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, social media-fueled panic overshadowed official response efforts. In 2021s Colonial Pipeline cyberattack, misinformation triggered unnecessary fuel shortages across the eastern U.S. In Maui, conspiracy theories about the Lahaina wildfires spread faster than emergency warnings. During last falls Hurricanes Helene and Milton, disinformation delayed life-saving actions, disrupted coordination with cross-sector partners, and triggered real-world threats of violence against federal employees. And during the Los Angeles wildfires, AI images of the Hollywood sign engulfed in flames circulated widely online, further straining a community trying to recover. Misinformation isnt just accidental. Its being weaponized. Foreign adversaries like China, Russia, and Iran actively exploit crises to deepen divisions, discredit institutions, and disrupt coordinated responses. We also see this challenge at home, where opportunists or inaccurate reporting are driven by ideology or self-interest to spread false narratives that lead to fear, confusion, and preventable missteps. In a crisis, these harmful tactics not only cloud reality but also actively undermine efforts to help people. Instead of leading through the crisis and mobilizing solutions, companies and government officials are forced into damage control and fighting falsehoods. For companies, false information can trigger stock market drops, supply chain delays, and public backlash. It can erode consumer confidence, spark boycotts, and force costly crisis response efforts that wouldnt otherwise be necessary. Fighting misinformation preemptively through systems, training, and partnerships isnt just good risk management. Its a direct investment in business continuity and brand resilience. And yes, it costs money. But the cost of doing nothing is often much higher. What Business Leaders Must Do Now Misinformation is more than a government problem. It affects every industryfrom energy and finance to retail and transportationand every size of business, from multinationals with global supply chains to small companies serving local communities. During catastrophic events like earthquakes, hurricanes, or cyberattacks, companies within disaster zones play a critical role in recovery. To lead effectively, they need the trust of employees, customers, and local communities. Misinformation undercuts that trust. And its not just during major disasters. In todays always-on information environment, false narratives can surface at any time and spread quickly. The more visible a company is, the more exposed it is to misinformation that can damage its reputation and its bottom line. Companies already recognize this risk, but the speed and scale of recent eventsduring wildfires, cyberattacks, and even routine service outagesshows that the landscape is evolving faster than most are prepared for. Many still lack the infrastructure or strategy to respond effectively. That means executive teams need to start preparing nownot after the fact. Heres how to get ahead of it: Adopt a trusted and battle-tested crisis framework The Federal Emergency Management Agencys Emergency Support Function #15 (ESF-15) is part of the National Response Framework, the federal playbook for how government coordinates during disasters. ESF-15 focuses specifically on external affairshow agencies manage public messaging, media relations, and stakeholder engagement under pressure. Companies can adapt key elements by clearly assigning communication roles, syncing messaging strategies across departments and with external partners, and preparing to respond quickly when false narratives start to spiral. It offers a way to operationalize the response to misinformation by focusing first on delivering accurate, life-safety information to the publicbefore becoming consumed by brand reputation concerns. Conduct high-stakes crisis simulations Most companies run drills for natural disasters or data breaches, but few test how theyd respond to viral misinformation. False narratives can spread faster than the facts, especially during high-stress events. If you havent practiced for that, youre not prepared. A strong simulation replicates how misinformation unfolds through a misleading social media post gaining traction, a fake image circulating, or a rumor targeting your product or executives. From there, teams must react in real timevalidating facts, aligning internal and external messaging, and deciding when and how to respond publicly. Run these scenarios with your full crisis team, including communications, legal, HR, and operations. Dont underestimate the value of having your companys executive team or board in the room. Use realistic conditions like time pressure, incomplete information, and conflicting stakeholder needs. And most importantly, build i consequences. Did the company overreact and make it worse? Did it wait too long to correct the record? These are the dynamics leaders must experience before the real thing hits. Establish public-private resilience networks In a crisis, coordination cant start from scratch. Companies in critical sectors like energy, telecom, and water need standing relationships with local, state, and regional response partners. Even as FEMAs future role becomes increasingly uncertain under the current administration, local and state emergency managers remain vital anchors in disaster response. Companies should identify their regional emergency management agencies and build relationships with leadership, external affairs, joint information centers, and recovery coordinators. Many cities and states already run public-private working groups and emergency operations centers where businesses can participate directly during response and recovery efforts. The goal is to align earlyon messaging, resource coordination, and community needs. When companies and local officials are already connected, theyre in a stronger position to counter confusion, support vulnerable populations, and help stabilize recovery. If federal coordination weakens as many suspect it will under current leadership, these local and state-level partnerships become even more essential. Diversify communication channels Misinformation doesnt wait for a natural disaster. It can spread during a product recall, a service outage, a viral rumor, or in the middle of a major storm. In any of these cases, relying on a single communication channel is a risk. If your website crashes, social media is flooded, or email deliverability drops, how will you reach the people who matter most? Companies already go to extraordinary lengths to get the word out when things go right. They’ll build multi-platform campaigns to sell a new streaming subscription, launch a product drop with a celebrity brand ambassador, or drive demand through social media content for the latest pair of Jordansensuring the message sticks, spreads, and leads to action. That same level of effort is needed when things go wrong. A layered strategy is key. Use tools you control, like text messages to customers, in-app notifications, email, and internal platforms like Slack. Back that up with special hotlines, direct outreach from managers, and even packaging inserts. Traditional and local news outlets are essential, but so is engaging with digital creators who have built trusted online communities of their own. These are the same channels companies already use to drive sales or launch productsnow they need to be ready to correct the record when things go sideways. For businesses with physical locations, point-of-sale signage or handouts can help reinforce the right message. And when systems go down, low-tech options like printed flyers, AM radio, or employee word of mouth may be the most effective of all. Whether its a brand crisis or a major emergency, the goal is the same: Make sure the right message gets to the right people at the right timeclearly, quickly, and through whatever channels are still standing. The Cost of Inaction Businesses that fail to adapt arent just falling behindtheyre exposing people, assets, and long-term viability to growing risk. Public experts and former officials have warned that our national disaster response systems are being hollowed out. The ongoing dismantling of FEMAs leadership and staffing, along with the rollback of coordination functions across federal agencies, is weakening both our emergency response and our broader national security posture. At the same time, the misinformation landscape is only getting more volatile. Bad actors are more sophisticated, AI is lowering the barrier to entry, and fewer trusted messengers remain in place to cut through the noise. Preparedness is no longer a best practiceits a market imperative. In the next crisis, it wont be the truth that drives action. Itll be whatever people hear first and believe fastest. But theres power in what companies do next. Trusted brands, clear communicators, and credible institutions have a unique role to playnot just in protecting their reputation, but in helping the public navigate uncertainty, especially right now. When businesses lead with clarity and humanity, they not only survive the next crisis, they also help shape a stronger, more resilient economy for everyone. And isnt that the clearest measure of brand strength todaynot just being known, but being believed when it matters most?
Category:
E-Commerce
The look of the health and wellness products at CVS is about to get a little less prescriptive. The pharmacy chain, which reported $94.59 billion in revenue in the first quarter of 2025, landing ahead of expectations, announced it is overhauling its packaging for 68 pain reliever products this month, with updated packaging to come for nearly 3,000 other health and wellness items by the end of 2026. The outgoing packaging for the pharmacy’s private-label health and wellness products looks overtly clinical, in some cases packing product information into small areas with tiny text. Consumers are already overwhelmed with so many options in the health and wellness category, according to Musab Balbale, CVS Health’s chief merchandising officer. While we continuously strive to innovate our brands, we had not conducted a complete update of the CVS Health brand identity in almost 10 years, Balbale tells Fast Company. Now, we are putting our CVS brand front and center to truly stand out on the shelf. The new look is streamlined, with a simpler CVS logo instead of CVS Health, flat colors instead of gradients, and bigger product labels. The packages are easier to read, and a simplified visual hierarchy emphasizes product benefits and features. It’s made for store shelves and for easy comprehension at a glance. Products for kids and babies will be labeled with a ladybug. The redesign was done over the course of a year by teams from across CVS Health working with outside partners including the brand design agency Pearlfisher. Why CVS is rebranding The new packaging is the latest example of a private-label rebrand as CVS and other retailers have invested more in their own product lines. As consumers traded down from national brands to store brands due to inflation since the pandemic, stores like Target and Walmart redesigned their house brands to grow their owned shelf space and revenue. With friendly, brightly colored packaging that’s more design-forward and high-end than many of the generic brands of years past, this new generation of private-label products is meant to reach high-income shoppers with big-box-store prices. For CVS, the new packaging was made with three goals in mind: modernizing the brand, bringing the brand front and center, and emphasizing product form and benefits to make the shopping experience easier. The larger goal is associating CVS with health and wellness at large. With this evolution of the CVS brand, we’re not only simplifying shopping for customers, but we’re also aiming to become the health and wellness brand they think of first when seeking trusted solutions that deliver value and convenience, Mike Wier, VP of store brands at CVS Health, said in a statement. CVS introduced a private-label snack brand called Well Market last year following an overhaul of CVS Beauty in 2023. Its new health and wellness product packaging represents a further investment into building a strong store brand for core product offerings.
Category:
E-Commerce
All news |
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||