When you have a big announcement to make, you know what people are going to ask. Go ahead and address the big issues upfront before they even have to bring it up.
If you want to be sure you cover all potential questions, get a team together. Talk about what questions, concerns, and issues people are going to have with the announcement. Come up with 5 or 6 questions you know people are going to have and include the information in your announcement.
Anticipating the problems and addressing the issues upfront will soften any pushback you might get.
As an example, At Disney, when we moved from paying people weekly to every other week and moved from paper checks to direct deposit only we knew this may cause concerns for some cast members.
Since we knew people would have some issues, in advance, we put together a process to help people set up a bank account if needed. Or help them set up direct deposit into their bank account. Offering the help upfront made adopting the new system easier for the people it would impact the most.
Working through this process will help you find ways you can help people.
Don't lay it out and tell people it is their problem. Problems caused to employees are your problems, too. Work with them to ease the concerns before they become problems.
Get it down to the basics. This will cover the biggest issues. One-off questions can be handled by individual managers.
