The September 11th attack
Tragedy tests employers

By Susan Hooper
Advertiser Staff Writer

T. Michael May, president and chief executive officer of Hawaiian Electric Co., was in the elevator at the company's headquarters Wednesday when he noticed that the woman riding with him looked upset.

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Honolulu workplace counselors provide these suggestions for helping businesses cope with last week's terrorist attacks. For employers: • See a local employee assistance program for help counseling employees. If you have an employee assistance program, let your employees know how it can help them. • Ask managers to stay in close touch with their employees, to see how they are. • Realize that different employees will have different responses to the tragedy. Be tolerant, not judgmental. • If an employee seems to be having persistent trouble, urge him or her to visit either an employee assistance counselor or a mental health professional • Tell employees of measures the company has taken to make the workplace more safe and secure. • Organize company events such as a blood drive or a disaster relief collection, so employees can feel that they are helping. For employees: • Realize you may experience a broad range of feelings in addition to sorrow and anger, including irritability, headaches, stomach aches or an inability to concentrate. All of these are normal responses, counselors say. • Limit your monitoring of news coverage of the aftermath of the attacks. Don't keep the radio or television on all day at work. • Talk about your feelings, either with family, friends and co-workers or with a counselor. • Stick to your normal workplace routine as much as possible. Work can be a welcome distraction. • Donate blood, contribute to a disaster relief fund or reach out to someone you know who has lost a loved one in the attacks. -- Susan Hooper

"I said, 'You seem troubled; what's wrong?' " May said. "And she said, 'I have a son on the Mainland in the military, and I worry what may happen to him.' Basically I said, 'It's too early for us to assume the worst, but I will keep him in my thoughts, as I do all of you as we go through these difficult times.' She just smiled."

Corporate psychologists and counselors say May did exactly the right thing.

After Tuesday's terrorist attacks, employees in workplaces around the country are struggling to carry on. Even if their family and friends are safe, employees at all levels are likely to experience a complex range of emotions that may make it hard for them to get their work done. But employers can help, experts say — from organizing projects such as a company blood drive to lending a sympathetic ear when a worker needs to talk.

"It's a tragic event for the country, and we need to tell our employees that we're all in this together," said Richard Rand, a Honolulu labor and employment lawyer.

Emotion at work

One of the difficulties traditionally buttoned-down employers may face is acknowledging that workers need to express how they feel about what happened. But experts say businesses will suffer if they don't respond to that need.

"It's imperative that we address the human side of the crisis," said Bruce Blythe, chief executive officer of Crisis Management International Inc., an Atlanta consulting firm. "If you don't take care of the human side of the crisis, you can't effectively get your people to help you recover from a business standpoint."

Debbie Hallof, president of the Honolulu consulting firm Business Advisory Group, said, "Often managers assume we'll park our emotions at the door, but we can't. As human beings, we bring those things to work. You can't park them outside the door and say, 'I'll pick you up on the way out.' "

Experts say firms should have both structured and informal help available for employees who need it. Structured help is often employee assistance programs, which typically offer free confidential individual and group counseling. Informal assistance can include offers of help from company managers.

To be prepared to do this, however, managers may want to brush up on their listening skills, Hallof said.

"Managers sometimes feel that they have to fix a problem, and that's not really necessary," she said. "Listening is important. It's really that employees want to be heard, not necessarily that they're expecting a manager to fix it. Managers should avoid getting caught up in that trap where they feel guilty, because obviously they can't fix something of this significance."

Far-reaching horror

Another challenge facing employers and employees is the sheer scope of last week's catastrophe.

"This is the most horrific thing that has ever happened to the nation in my lifetime," said May, who is 54. "We've seen the Oklahoma City bombing. We've seen the Kennedy assassination. But the breadth and depth and the impact that this has on our nation is just so far-reaching."

Because of that, counselors say, the emotions that people normally feel with any tragedy are greatly magnified.

"This is not a normal kind of stress like being stuck in traffic," said Linda Foye, president of Workplace Solutions, a Honolulu employee assistance program. "This is way beyond the ordinary. Most of us know how we'll react under normal day-to-day stress, but when the stressor is deeper and affects us at deeper levels, we're going to possibly react in different ways.

"I've had people say they have been doing something that is part of their normal routine, like being at the copy machine, and all of a sudden they'll start to cry," Foye said. "Employers need to know that and recognize it and not go into a panic if all of a sudden there are folks reacting in different ways."

Other counselors agree.

"Trauma has a way of making people feel like they're crazy," said Catherine Bruns, administrator of Hawaii Employee Assistance Services, a division of the nonprofit agency Child & Family Service.

"All of these reactions that people are having — whether it be headache, to irritation, to concentration problems, to jitteriness — are all normal reactions to an abnormal situation. And that's kind of the mantra that we repeat for everybody right now."

This range of reactions heightens the difficulty employers face in helping their workers cope with last week's disaster, counselors say. No two employees will react in the same way. And in larger workplaces, there is likely to be a wide range of links to the tragedy — from those with no connection to those who have lost a loved one.

In addition, last week's horror can reopen fresh wounds for employees who recently have been through other kinds of emotional stress, counselors say.

But there is some good news for employers, counselors said. For those workers who are not severely traumatized, work can help take their minds off the incomprehensible events of last week.

"Distraction is a good technique" for dealing with anxiety, said Gary Farkas, Honolulu corporate psychologist. "And work is a good distraction from anxiety about the outside world."

Looking ahead

Even as they struggle to calm employees' immediate fears, Foye suggested businesses start considering how they will operate in this new climate.

"There's such a long recovery period coming up with so many unknowns that I think management practices really need to be looked at," she said. " ... Managers need to really take a look at ... how good they are at managing change, because the change is going to happen. And it's not something we chose, which makes it even harder. It's being forced on us by this horrific act."

Reach Susan Hooper at shooper@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8064.