Q. Liz your HR tips are incredible. Got a tip for employee email queries sent to me, the HR director, that should have gone to the in-country HR person on my team? I feel bad just forwarding the email because the employee wrote to me directly but I’m not sure how else to do it.

A. Forward the message to the local HR person and copy the employee on the forwarded email.

“Dear Raul, thanks for writing to me about the details of your dental plan. I’m forwarding your query to Teresa Aguilera, our HR director for Spain. (Teresa, meet Raul & vice versa)

“I know Teresa will take care of your issue, but if for some reason you and she don’t connect please let me know.

Apart from the dental plan, how are things going? What’s new in the Madrid office? I’d love to hear more about you & your role. Thanks so much, me”

I sent out tons of these a week. The responses were tremendous. When every interaction shows that you care about the person, you make friends. I made friends all over the world this way, including a young teammate in Ireland named Liam Ryan whose emails often ended up in my inbox

You can establish trust without knowing someone face-to-face or even via video. Gave me comfort knowing there were folks who would alert me if something was messed up in one of our facilities anywhere in the world, because they trusted me

My golden rule for HR folks & leaders is this: every communication carries two intertwined messages. One is the actual content of the message. The other is a message about the relationship between you and the person you’re communicating with.

That second, critical message is conveyed in the language you choose, your tone, your speed in responding, your avoidance of bureaucratic terms, etc. You’re sending out waves of trust. You’re sending out subatomic particles of good feeling. I call them COMMUNITRONS

Most important part of any HR job, if you ask me

Of course, I would be in contact with Teresa and her counterparts as well, but everybody is spread thin and even in one country or one city we can’t assume that everyone would know their HR person or feel safe reaching out to HR.

So the more people spreading COMMUNITRONS around, the better