Most HR leaders have lived through some version of this: a hiring freeze that came out of nowhere, a budget meeting where headcount got cut before anyone had time to plan around it, a team that went quiet because nobody could say for certain what was coming next.
The details change, but the feeling doesn't, and neither does the fact that HR has managed through versions of this before.
The organizations that come through a period of economic uncertainty intact are usually the ones that built their planning habits, communication practices, and support systems before conditions shifted, not the ones that scrambled once they did.
A plan built only for stable conditions tends to fall apart the moment conditions change, which forces HR into reactive decisions made under pressure, with less information than they'd have preferred.
And uncertainty doesn't always show up as a downturn. It can also mean a hiring surge that outpaces the org chart, a supply shock that reshuffles priorities overnight, or a stretch where nobody, including leadership, knows which direction things are headed. A plan built with some flexibility already in it gives HR a starting point for responding, rather than reacting from scratch, whichever version of unpredictability actually shows up.
This is the shift from workforce planning as an occasional exercise to workforce planning as an ongoing discipline, and it's the difference between HR having options when conditions shift and starting from scratch every time they do.
Economic pressure rarely announces itself as a single event. It shows up as a series of smaller decisions, each one forcing HR to weigh competing priorities with less certainty than they'd like.
These decisions come up again and again, regardless of what triggered the downturn.
Not every role carries the same risk when budgets tighten. Some positions become vulnerable to elimination, others become harder to fill because candidates are less willing to leave stable jobs, and a smaller set of roles can become more critical than they were before the pressure started.
The challenge for HR is telling these apart before decisions get made under time pressure. Waiting until a budget meeting to figure out which roles are essential means making that call with the least information and the least time to get it right.
Cost control and employee engagement tend to get treated as opposing forces, and during periods of uncertainty that framing gets reinforced fast. Hiring freezes, delayed raises, and reduced training budgets are often the first response to financial pressure, and each one chips away at the sense of stability employees rely on.
The tension is real, but it isn't automatic. HR teams that keep engagement on the table as a cost decision gets made, rather than addressing it afterward as damage control, tend to come out of a volatile period with more trust intact.
Workforce planning designed around stable assumptions can become less useful when business conditions change rapidly. IHRIM notes that traditional strategic workforce planning, often based on 3-to-10-year labor forecasts, is frequently viewed by fast-moving organizations as too theoretical, static, and disconnected from the pace of business change. The organization argues for supplementing those structural processes with more dynamic, responsive approaches that reflect current economic, social, and employment turbulence.
One example is cross-company employee lending. Drawing on a Harvard Business Review article, IHRIM discusses organizations borrowing groups of employees to meet spikes in demand, such as in home delivery or production, while helping other employers avoid layoffs during an economic crisis. IHRIM says the immediate benefit is improved operational efficiency through reallocating people to areas of greatest need. It also suggests possible longer-term upside, including partnerships, alliances, organizational agility, and exposure to new skills.
Organizations that build this kind of flexibility into their planning are working from options when conditions shift, rather than starting from scratch.
When economic pressure sets in, retention depends on more than compensation. It also depends on how people experience their day-to-day work. Three strategies matter most for HR during this kind of stretch.
Employees can't control the broader economy, but they take real cues from how their own manager behaves when conditions get uncertain.A leader who stays visible, keeps meetings on the calendar, and keeps talking about the work ahead sends a different signal than one who goes quiet or starts canceling check-ins.
That doesn't mean pretending everything is fine. It means staying present and specific: talking through what's actually changing, what isn't, and what an employee can still expect from their role, rather than letting silence fill in the gaps on its own.
For managers, that consistency is often more within reach than anything tied to budget. Not disappearing when things get hard costs nothing but attention, and it's the kind of attention employees remember once conditions stabilize.
Uncertainty creates an information vacuum, which tends to be filled with worst-case assumptions.
Mercer's guidance on workforce communication during uncertain periods echoes a point Gallup's research made over a decade earlier: consistency and clarity matter more than having every answer.
That means regular updates even when there's little new to report, and straightforward language about what is and isn't known. It also means pointing employees toward available resources, including EAP services, as part of that communication rather than as an afterthought.
Resilience gets built well before a disruption hits, through the habits and support systems already in place when conditions shift.
Drawing on workplace-experience data from more than 1,700 organizations, representing roughly 5 million employees, tracked over 15 years, Great Place to Work examined company performance through the Great Recession. In its two-year stock-market comparison from December 2007 through December 2009, publicly traded companies whose key employee groups reported very positive workplace experiences gained 14.4%, while the S&P 500 declined 35.5%. This is an observational comparison from one recession, not proof that employee support alone caused the difference. But the roughly 50-percentage-point gap is large enough to merit attention.
That's worth remembering on its own: employees carry the memory of how they were treated during a hard stretch, and it shapes retention long after conditions improve.
EAP support is sometimes treated as a benefit that sits apart from workforce planning, something HR points employees toward after a decision has already been made rather than something built into the decision itself.
Mercer’s David Kopsch lists workforce planning and making employee assistance programs and counseling available among the concrete actions employers can take to maintain workforce engagement during periods of economic uncertainty. He places those measures alongside clear, empathetic communication, concluding that workforce planning, communication, and well-being support can help organizations prepare both their people and operations for volatility.
That framing suggests these should not be managed as isolated line items. Coordinating staffing decisions with communication and accessible support can give employees more clarity and practical help when economic pressures intensify.
What that looks like in practice varies by situation, but a few patterns hold up across most organizations:
None of this requires new infrastructure. It requires treating EAP access as something to communicate proactively rather than something that just exists in a benefits packet.
Utilization data shows whether an EAP is actually being used, not whether it's helping the people who use it. A rise in utilization could reflect greater awareness of the benefit, greater need during a hard stretch, or both, so it's worth reading alongside aggregate, de-identified outcome and satisfaction data most EAP providers can report, rather than as a stand-alone measure of impact.
Tracking utilization over time, rather than checking it once a year, makes it possible to see whether it moves in response to specific events like a round of layoffs, a leadership change, or a period of extended uncertainty. That pattern, paired with provider-reported outcomes, gives HR a fuller picture than utilization numbers alone.
Workforce planning isn't something to evaluate once a year, after the fact. It works best as an ongoing practice, tracked continuously so adjustments happen while they're still useful, not months after a problem has already taken root.
None of these numbers mean much when read individually. However, a decline in engagement during a hiring freeze is worth investigating rather than dismissing. A decline that persists after conditions stabilize is a stronger signal that something beyond the immediate disruption needs attention.
The real value of tracking these metrics comes from feeding them back into the planning process itself. If time-to-fill is climbing for roles flagged as critical, that's a signal to revisit the workforce plan, not just a data point to report.
Treating measurement as a closed loop, where the numbers actually change what HR does next, is what separates organizations that adjust course early from those that discover a problem only once it's fully formed.
HR doesn't have to build this capacity alone. The Ulliance Life Advisor Resolution EAP Model® gives organizations a partner for the parts of workforce planning that are hardest to handle internally, like confidential counseling and crisis support for employees and eligible family members under the employer's plan.
That support isn't limited to employees calling in on their own. Ulliance also works directly with HR and people managers, through management consultation, on how to handle a specific rollout, a round of layoffs, or a stretch where a team's morale needs more than a generic all-hands email. That's often the harder half of the work: not just having a resource to point employees toward, but having someone to call when HR itself isn't sure how to handle what's in front of them.
When you partner with Ulliance, our Life Advisor Consultants are always just a phone call away to teach ways to enhance your work/life balance and increase your happiness. The Ulliance Life Advisor Employee Assistance Program can help employees and employers come closer to a state of total well-being.
Investing in the right EAP or Wellness Program to support your employees will help them and help you. Visit https://ulliance.com/ or call 866-648-8326.
The Ulliance Employee Assistance Program can address the
following issues:
• Stress about work or job performance
• Crisis in the workplace
• Conflict resolution at work or in one’s personal life
• Marital or relationship problems
• Child or elder care concerns
• Financial worries
• Mental health problems
• Alcohol/substance abuse
• Grief
• Interpersonal conflicts
• AND MORE!
References:
How to Bolster Employees’ Confidence; Gallup Business Journal; Steve Crabtree
https://news.gallup.com/businessjournal/126173/bolster-employees-confidence.aspx
Managing the Workforce in Economic Uncertainty; Mercer; David Kopsch
https://www.mercer.com/en-us/insights/talent-and-transformation/attracting-and-retaining-talent/managing-the-workforce-in-economic-uncertainty/
Managing Your Workforce Amid Intense Uncertainty; Gallup Business Journal; Jennifer Robison
https://news.gallup.com/businessjournal/158003/managing-workforce-amid-intense-uncertainty.aspx
Navigating Uncertainty: Why Clear Communication Is Crucial for Employee Engagement; Mercer; Erica Callahan, Sean Connelly
https://www.mercer.com/en-us/insights/people-strategy/navigating-uncertainty-why-clear-communication-is-crucial-for-employee-engagement/
Rethinking Workforce Planning in Times of Uncertainty; IHRIM
https://www.ihrim.org/2020/08/rethinking-workforce-planning-in-times-of-uncertainty-by-mick-collins-chair-ihrim/
The 5 Employee Groups That Can Make or Break Your Recovery From a Recession; Great Place To Work
https://www.greatplacetowork.com/resources/reports/recession-report