Layoffs, job cuts, restructuring – these terms have become an integral part of our everyday work in recent years. According to an economic survey by the German Economic Institute, 36 percent of German companies plan to cut jobs in 2026. The associated uncertainties paralyze many employees, while the pressure to succeed continues to increase in times of economic crisis.
A lot of pressure, but it doesn’t necessarily have to result in exhaustion. There is often more room for maneuver between the pressure that comes from outside and the pressure that we create ourselves than we initially assume. This article shows five levers that HR can use to ensure that performance remains possible even when the environment is anything but stable.
1. Reality check: How affected is my company really?
Not every crisis affects every company in the same way. But the mere fact that we hear so much about the economic situation and the increased job cuts increases the mental strain. Regardless of whether a threat is real or just perceived as such – both can cause stress reactions. Headlines about mass layoffs in the industry can therefore feel just as paralyzing as a concrete announcement within your own company.
In addition, people tend to have so-called cognitive distortions in times of crisis. We imagine the worst possible outcome, the focus narrows on problems, and thoughts like “We’re all going to be fired” quickly gain traction. These thought patterns are human, they are not helpful.
Fear can act as a short-term driver – it sharpens focus and mobilizes energy in threatening situations. But if the state of emergency becomes a permanent state, the effect is reversed: employees who work permanently driven by fear have difficulty concentrating, are less creative and productive and are under chronic stress.
What HR can do to prevent cognitive biases and anxiety:
- Talk regularly and transparently about challenges facing the company
- Initiate a shared reality check: What do we actually know? What are our specific challenges – and where are things going well despite the current situation?
- Create space in which employees can address uncertainties without having to fear sanctions
2. Self-efficacy: Focus on what can be designed
In order to move from paralysis – caused by excessive demands or fear – to the ability to act, the team’s attention can be consciously directed to what can actually be influenced.
The US management consultant and best-selling author Stephen Covey has developed a memorable model for this: The “Circle of Influence” distinguishes between what we can directly control – our decisions, our reactions, our priorities – and what lies outside our sphere of influence, such as economic developments or corporate management decisions. The idea behind it: People can learn to direct their energy more where they can actually make a difference. This not only reduces the feeling of powerlessness, but also strengthens self-efficacy in the team.
This also means accepting the unchangeable reality instead of fighting against it. Easier said than done, but trainable. Because self-efficacy is not a personality trait that you are born with, but an attitude that can be developed. And it protects against what is particularly threatening in times of crisis: chronic overwork and exhaustion.
What HR can do specifically:
- Clearly identify risks and challenges, but consciously direct communication towards scope for action: What can we do now? What small successes are already visible today?
- Actively communicate what is going well: especially in uncertain times, this quickly fades into the background. It is important to make well-functioning areas and strengths of the team visible.
- Actively communicate and celebrate progress and milestones: The focus should not only be on the final results, but also on partial successes and learnings from mistakes and experiments. Especially in difficult phases, people need visible evidence that their actions are making a difference.
- Actively promote a growth mindset in the team: HR can help the team see challenges as opportunities for personal growth instead of as setbacks. One way could, for example, be to have a fixed section for “successes and setbacks” in regular meetings in order to learn from them together instead of silently ignoring mistakes.
3. Make performance sustainable: There is no success without breaks
When the pressure mounts, the first impulse is often the same: do more, work longer, fight harder. The intention behind it: to make yourself so indispensable that your job is secure. This is understandable, but also deceptive. Because especially under high pressure, sustainable performance is not a sprint, but a marathon. And you don’t win marathons by going full throttle right from the start. Otherwise you will eventually burn out under the constant stress.
Self-care should therefore not become a minor matter, especially in stressful phases. Short breaks between meetings, fixed focus time blocks without interruptions, a conscious ritual at the end of the day – these are not luxury measures, but the basis for long-term performance.
What HR can do specifically:
- Enable flexible work arrangements and provide low-threshold offers for mental and physical health
- Establish clear expectations and transparent prioritizations together with managers so that employees know what really matters
- Actively signal that your own health should be taken into account, as this is precisely how good work can be done
4. Strengthen resilience: Mental health as an organizational task
Resilience is often treated as an individual characteristic. This perspective falls short. Individual employees cannot remain resilient in the long term if the system in which they work permanently destabilizes them. Individual and organizational resilience are mutually dependent.
The personal responsibility of employees remains important, but it is not just a key competence for individuals, but for entire organizations. The foundation for this is psychological safety: In a climate in which employees are afraid of losing their jobs, creative thinking is not done, mistakes are not admitted and uncomfortable truths are not spoken. This is a dangerous combination, especially in times of crisis.
What HR can do specifically:
- Introduce early warning systems: Regular pulse checks or digital feedback formats help to identify stress at an early stage before it becomes a crisis
- Provide external contact points and training – workshops on stress management and resilience training, supplemented by coaching or psychology offers
- Create spaces for exchange: Formats such as peer mentoring or “Resilience Circles” are small, fixed groups of four to eight employees who meet regularly to talk openly about current stresses, develop solutions together and strengthen each other. Unlike classic team meetings, the focus here is not on operational matters, but rather on an honest exchange about what is currently mentally and emotionally challenging.
5. Optimism as a leadership tool: get managers on board
The mood in the company is not determined by headlines, but by the culture that is lived every day. And above all, how managers shape this culture in their everyday lives. All the principles described in this article ultimately end up with them: communicating realistically about challenges, directing the team’s energy towards what can be done, making successes visible and leading by example.
Managers with realistic, positive expectations often achieve the best results. This does not mean sugarcoating numbers or a slogan of perseverance. Realistic optimism means having clarity about the actual situation while focusing on what the team can influence and achieve.
How HR can support managers:
- Offer training on resilient leadership with concrete tools for solution-oriented communication and dealing with uncertainty in the team
- Give managers space to work on their own resilience, for example through 1:1 sessions with psychologists or peer formats in which they can exchange ideas on equal terms
- Engage managers as co-creators of a culture in which mental health and performance are considered together
Economic pressure does not have to become a constant stressor
Economic pressure cannot be explained away. But companies can decide how to deal with this pressure internally. HR can make a difference here than is often assumed: through transparent communication that directs attention to the next steps, through offers that do not leave resilience to chance, and through managers who demonstrate that self-care and performance are not contradictions. In the end, teams that feel safe and are not under constant stress work better and are happier.
