Skip-level meetings can ease restructuring - includes suggested skip-level interview questions

Here's a way for managers of reorganized work units to get to know employees one or more levels down and to build trust.
Downsizing, re-engineering, restructuring and many other organizational shifts are causing units, departments and divisions to be combined and changed in dramatic ways. Often, the manager who inherits this new situation needs to quickly and efficiently acquire a working knowledge of the new entity. One of the best sources of information is employees.
No doubt managers will want to speak with their new direct reports to get their viewpoints on the "lay of the land." But there is another source of information available. By skipping a level or two and getting acquainted with the employees who are removed from their direct supervision, managers may gain even more insight into how things work.
WHAT IS A SKIP-LEVEL MEETING?
This meeting is a type of structured interview. The general purpose is to give managers an opportunity to gather employees' thoughts about the organization and to learn of their satisfactions, dissatisfactions and recommendations for the future. The skip-level meeting is also a way for managers to inform employees about their goals, standards, the type of work culture they would like to establish, and--most importantly--show that they care about the employees.