Managing Through Reorganizations | Gergely Nemeth

The person most affected by a reorg must hear first, directly from you, not in a group setting. This sounds obvious but gets violated constantly. Managers schedule team meetings to announce changes because it seems efficient, but the person whose job is changing dramatically sits in the same room as someone whose job isn't, both hearing this for the first time together. One needs space to react. The other wonders why this meeting exists. The sequence is everything: affected person hears from you one-on-one, then their new manager gets briefed, then adjacent team members, then stakeholders, then the broader org. This is tedious. You'll repeat yourself many times. Some conversations run long because people need to process and your schedule shifts. Do it anyway.

Before any conversations happen, you need the human why clear, not just org-chart logic. Most managers underinvest here, thinking the reasoning is self-evident. It's not obvious to the person whose world is changing. "Will I still work on the mobile app?" might really mean "Am I being punished?" "Who's my new manager?" might mean "Did my old manager not want me anymore?" Draft your core message before starting conversations. Pressure test it with someone you trust who'll ask the question you forgot to anticipate and tell you if your why sounds like corporate speak instead of genuine reasoning.

The danger zone exists between when a reorg is decided and when it's announced. Every day in that window is a day where the wrong person might hear something, speculation spreads, your best engineer updates their resume assuming the worst. Once leadership commits to change, your job is communicating it as quickly as possible while still being thoughtful. Speed and thoughtfulness require each other. Rushing without preparation creates confused, inconsistent messaging. Preparing endlessly without urgency breeds rumors and anxiety. The announcement isn't the end or even the middle. Schedule follow-ups within three to five days with everyone whose role changed significantly, not to check if they're okay with it but to see how they're settling in, what questions came up, what isn't working that you couldn't predict. People remember how they were treated during transitions. A well-designed org structure with terrible communication breeds resentment and attrition. A merely decent org structure with excellent communication builds trust.