Good internal communication ensures clarity for everyone in the organization. But what is effective internal communication and how does it work?
An effective internal communication strategy is important to any successful organization. It is significant to the people agenda – providing information, engagement, education and inspiration. It is key to team building.
Often than not, we prioritize communication to customers, shareholders, government officials, communities, vendors and suppliers but not among ourselves as an entire organization or part of an organization.
There are several tools and channels that make it easy to manage internal communications. You can develop your own or buy various software including SnapComms, Communifire and Yammer just to mention a few. You can also go from e-newsletters, emails, wall papers, screen savers, posters, SMS and intranet etc.
There are also the one-to-group engagements – including staff durbars, roadshows and inter-departmental competitions, etc. Again, depending on the specific objective, you could go from branded content to personalized gifts.
- What is the Impact of Internal Communications?
- How does Internal Business Communication Affect the Organization?
- What is Reputation in Communication?
- What are the Benefits of Internal Communications?
- How is Internal Communication Impact Measured?
- How Does Internal Communication Motivate Employees?
- How Internal Communication Affects Customer Engagement?
- What are the Benefits of Having Strong Internal Communication Strategy?
What is the Impact of Internal Communications?
Internal communication sharpens business acumen providing them clearer direction, enhances managerial skills and wins employee support to bring change in the organization. Internal communication creates positive and effective impacts that have direct relationship on business performance.
Read Also: Role of Moral Principles in Business Decision Making
Internal communication shares information about the company so employees can perform their jobs well. It keeps people informed.
Internal communication’s purpose is to provide an effective flow of information between an organization’s departments and colleagues. This applies both up and down the management/employee chain. It also works among employees who are interacting with each other in the company.
Solid internal communication nurtures company culture and builds employee engagement.
As professionals managing a company’s reputation, the following are some of reasons why we need to pay attention to internal communication.
They are our first brand ambassadors
Employees represent our organization – unofficially they are the spokespersons and brand ambassadors. They are the first point of contact for friends and family and anyone who wants to know more about the organization. We do ourselves a lot of disservice when we take them for granted. As a rule, any communication that will go out to customers and the public should first be shared in-house.
When people (including customers and potential employees) want additional information, beyond what is on our website and social media pages, they call friends and family that work in our organizations. The feedback they receive often carries more weight than what the commercials in the media say.
Creating an engaging work place and sense of higher purpose
As employees, we all want to know and understand the goal of the organization, the plan to achieving it and most importantly how we can contribute. How can we achieve such targets if we don’t communicate consistently with staff including sharing the various KPIs and or milestones? It is important to rally everybody towards the goal.
People love to read about themselves, their colleagues and teams, a well-executed internal communication strategy makes us feel we are on the path to greatness in our organization. It creates a sense of belonging, unity and or community. It reduces working in silos and employee turnover in some cases. When we are well informed about the vision and what others are working on, we collaborate better and support each other.
Keeping the brand promise and satisfying customers
Employees are executioners of the brand purpose. A good brand purpose enables us to differentiate and connect emotionally to our customers. Well informed, educated and engaged employees often feel empowered and this is reflected in how they work – attentive and supportive to the needs of our customers/stakeholders. They embody the brand purpose and promise and would go the extra mile to do an excellent job.
Staying in control of the narrative
Like any human institution the rumour mill is always buzzing. Are they selling, are they merging, is the CEO leaving, is the strategy and direction changing? Sometimes silence can also be a strategy – if we have considered the options, risks and consequences thereof.
Some rumour can be unsettling though and could affect employee morale and performance. As an organization, it is important to be transparent and stay in control of the narrative. Internal communication can proactively reduce the rumour mill and take control of the narrative by keeping employees informed and updated.
It is important to crises management
Most organizations have a core Crises Management or Business Continuity Team which often includes a Communications professional. When there is a crisis, the priority is to clean up the situation and communicate to external stakeholders – customers, investors, and the media. Employees should be part of the stakeholders; they are bound to be even more worried and or confused.
It is important to engage them – they are the ones going to manage the crises and implement the next steps. Remember what I said above about employees being brand ambassadors? It also helps to stay in control of the narrative including what they say unofficially to friends, family and customers.
From experience, internal communication has a way of keeping everybody together especially in very challenging times. By sharing information on the incident, the next steps and preventive measures we are all aligned and have a united front.
How does Internal Business Communication Affect the Organization?
Here are 10 key reasons that highlight the importance of internal communication:
1. Boosts employee engagement and productivity
Start the right conversations across your organization and bring leaders, partners, and employees together to focus on internal strategies that boost engagement and productivity. Employees should be encouraged to submit their ideas and opinions. This makes them feel valued and listened to, which leads to engagement. When employees are actively engaged, they are motivated to work harder and do better quality work on the job.
These types of conversations can be set up easily through internal communication platforms. There’s no need for long time-wasting meetings.
2. Promotes the supply of information
Another of the benefits of internal communication is that it delivers the right message to the relevant people. Modern technology means most of us connect at some point during the day, particularly at work. Many employees have access to a company intranet, which they can connect to when it suits them and keep up to date with relevant communications.
Effective internal communication also ensures employees don’t suffer from information overload. It avoids the need to spend hours sending and reading emails, messages, and comments.
3. Improves employee experience
Organizations can use internal communication to improve the employee experience This helps maintain employee retention, as working for a company that cares about its people sends out a positive message. Internal communication can be used to advertise:
- company events
- sports club membership
- free healthy drinks and snacks
- free cab service for employees that work late
- the introduction of a chill-out area
Unless everyone knows about these benefits they won’t be able to take advantage of them. This is why the internal communication role is important for both business and leisure time.
4. Sharing goals and objectives
One of the best ways to communicate the roadmap of your business is by leveraging your internal communication platform. Giving an overview and explaining your goals through a consistent information flow helps employees feel well-informed and capable of taking actions.
A clear roadmap also emphasizes company strategy so everyone in a team or department has a defined view of where the organization is heading. It gives a single, clear reference point that summarizes the overall objectives. This clarity can promote confidence in making decisions and carrying out roles.
5. Provides focus points
Internal communication can be used to align and guide teams on how to prioritize and distribute effort. Clear internal communication in the work environment ensures employees are aware of deadlines and can set time schedules to achieve them. This focus also emphasizes how a smaller project fits into the overall picture and why a specific deadline is important. For example, the installation of new software for the HR department may need to be implemented to capture a seasonal trend.
6. Drives action
Internal communication promotes both internal and external action. For example, it can authorize people to go ahead with a task, ask them to communicate with suppliers or collect opinions via the number of likes for a new product on an intranet page. It can take seconds to communicate a piece of information clearly and effectively.
People are more inclined to respond if they just have to press a button, rather than write a long response. This especially applies to the younger generations, who’ve grown up in the digital era.
7. Brings people together in difficult situations
In times of crisis, internal communication is a valuable tool. Being able to communicate fast and easily with the right people in the organization can reduce stress and get things done.
Another of the advantages of internal communication in a crisis is that it can alleviate rumors. Nothing spreads faster than office gossip, and accurate communication from management can prevent negative situations. This can also feed through to external communication, as an organization’s reputation can easily be damaged by rumors that aren’t true.
8. Allows for change
Technology is fast-moving. Competition is fierce and companies have to stay ahead of the competition to be successful. Why is internal communication important in this respect? Because it allows businesses to respond fast to climatic, environmental, and unexpected situations.
This could range from a retail store reducing the price of bread in every store in the state to match the competition, to warning staff in the travel industry of bad weather. Strong internal communication can mean the difference between averting or suffering a crisis.
9. Crosses borders
The importance of communication in international business can be seen in global organizations. Employees may be working in different time zones and only have a limited window to hold video meetings or telephone calls. Effective internal communication assists understanding, particularly if people speak different languages.
It’s also important to consider culture when communicating with colleagues in a different country. The tone of the communication should respect any cultural differences in terms of attitude to work, behavior, and customs.
10. Promotes the brand
According to Gartner Communications, “Employees who feel well-informed become a company’s most credible ambassadors externally, while they may become its fiercest critics if they do not.”
Positive external communication is the key to strengthening an organization’s reputation. When employees talk about the company and share information through social media they become advocates. This form of brand-building can impact an organization’s success and results from clear internal communication that encourages employees to share information.
What is Reputation in Communication?
We would suggest that there are two definitions of reputation, one from the perspective of the company and the other from the perspective of stakeholders. It is important, we believe, that organizations keep these two perspectives in mind:
From the perspective of the organization, reputation is an intangible asset that allows the company to better manage the expectations and needs of its various stakeholders, creating differentiation and barriers vis-à-vis its competitors.
From the perspective of stakeholders, reputation is the intellectual, emotional and behavioral response as to whether or not the communications and actions of an organization resonate with their needs and interests.
To the extent that stakeholders believe that the organization meets their needs better than can competitors, they will behave toward the organization in desirable ways, e.g., invest, join, support, etc. As companies meet the needs and interests of stakeholders over time, they increase their reputation resilience and diminish their reputation risk, providing themselves with a “halo effect” that can serve them well in times of trouble.
What are the Benefits of Internal Communications?
Internal communication is far more than just casual socialization among employees. Instead, it’s about facilitating effective conversations between all the people within an organization to allow for the successful flow of information between teams and individual employees. In addition, this constant conversation builds social capital.
A characteristic of good employee communication is that it isn’t just top-down but also bottom-up. A study published in the Journal of Communication Management showed that communication had to be symmetrical in order to enable good employee communication behaviors. The study indicates that symmetrical information required two things:
- Complete and fair information to employees, and
- Internal communication practices that listen to employees and invite their participation.
The goal of internal communications is to inform, influence, and engage. The purpose is to build trust in the workplace, improve knowledge sharing, empower employees, and create a synergy that gets everyone on board with the company’s overall goals.
Let’s review some of the benefits you can expect when you get staff communication to work smoothly.
1. Improve Employee Alignment
It sounds simple enough — if you aren’t familiar with the company’s strategy, it’s hard to know how you can contribute to it. But, unfortunately, that’s the case for most employees. A study by Robert S Kaplan and David P Norton shows that an average of 95% of all employees are unaware of the company’s strategy.
Let’s make sure that the remaining five percent work with you. The right internal communications strategy helps communicate your strategy, vision, and goals in a consistent, attractive way that involves employees.
The better they know the goals, the easier they can align their work to help reach the targets.
2. Build Trust
By increasing transparency and improving internal communications, you increase the trust employees feel for the company and its leaders.
A Ph.D. thesis at Brunel University London shows internal communication initiatives such as constant feedback, information sharing, and open communication channels contribute to higher co-worker trust and higher employee engagement.
While employee communication is often shared only within the company, there are benefits to keeping parts of it public. For example, a study on hospitality workers showed increased trust when certain information aimed at employees was shared through social media.
Increased trust can also lead to increased engagement, which leads to a slew of other benefits:
3. Increase Engagement
Employee engagement is a key to lower turnover, increased work performance, and improved job satisfaction. Studies link symmetrical internal communications to positive employee engagement. No wonder — when employees feel heard, they are more likely to be active and engaged in the workplace.
4. Improve Employee Performance
Studies show that internal communications have a direct impact on employee performance. In order to contribute to a positive environment, studies suggest that the conversation needs to be frequent, transparent, and honest.
5. Improve Brand Image
For customer-facing companies, frontline employees are the face of the organization. Their actions reflect directly on the customers’ brand experience.
Through improved staff communication, customer-facing employees improve their ability to communicate brand-specific information, meaning that you get a better, more brand-consistent performance.
6. Better Crisis Management
A good internal communications strategy helps you reach employees — both with the message and its contents. This matter is crucial in times of urgent company news.
Do you have difficult news to share? A history of honest communication helps manage the negative impact and discuss ways forward.
7. Decrease Security Risks
It may come as no surprise that employees are considered a company’s largest cybersecurity risk. Changes in IT policies, security breaches, and mandatory updates are just a few of the things employees need to be familiar with to keep security high.
However, technical information can occasionally be cumbersome or difficult to grasp. By thinking through the message and the channels, you can improve communications and overall security.
8. Increase Feedback and Whistleblowing
Good employee communication is a two-way street. However, 37% of employees feel that the company lacks systems for recommending problem fixes. Employees that feel heard are more likely to report any wrongdoings or company issues.
How is Internal Communication Impact Measured?
While obvious to many in the industry, it’s worth pausing to consider why measuring the impact of employee communications efforts is so important. Here are a few — but my no means all — reasons to have a plan in place to measure success.
— It gives an indication of employee engagement with the company.
Investing the time and resources for tools to effectively measure internal communications can serve as a great proxy for other teams in terms of the level of engagement among different parts of an organization.
— Internal communications efforts can be tied directly to company goals.
When employees are engaged in their work and communicating effectively, they are much more likely to reach a company’s stated goals.
— Measuring communication KPIs can identify the type of content, information and knowledge that employees want.
Along with determining what types of content employees respond to best, enterprises can also eliminate the forms that are least effective (or use them less often).
— It surfaces low-hanging fruit.
Spending time on the channels where employees are interested increases effectiveness.
Here are 10 frequently used internal communication metrics:
1. Employee Engagement Rates
This is one of the most important gauges used to measure the effectiveness of internal communications. Actively engaged employees are happier in their work and they are more dedicated to their employer. They feel they are respected for their contribution to the company’s success and they respect their managers and co-workers.
Employee surveys on the subject of overall work satisfaction and effective communications can get a baseline of how workers feel about communication in the workplace. The company intranet can help to measure employee engagement with key performance indicators (KPIs) such as readership, participation and social metrics like the number of likes, shares, and comments a piece of content or community generates.
2. Open Rates or Intranet Read-Receipts
A leadership note or communication on new safety procedures can be clear and inspiring, but it won’t matter if the majority of employees don’t read it. A 2019 survey found that company-wide emails were only opened 21.33% of the time!
Open-rates and other email metrics are useful, but leveraging read receipts on a company intranet can be far more important in terms of measuring whether an employee actually acknowledged receiving and reading important updates.
3. Page Visits and Logins
When developing a plan to measure communications in the workplace, it’s important to capture unique page views and other easily observable metrics for day-to-day optimization. Tracking how often employees log into the company intranet, how long they stay there whether they participate in communities and more gives employee communications professionals an idea of the level of effectiveness of an internal communication strategy. Keep in mind that the majority of corporate employees (87%) don’t feel that their employer “communicates effectively” with them.
Enterprises will also want to track when employees are logging into the intranet. For maximum engagement, it’s easy to schedule company-wide announcements or news announcements for times when traffic is likely to be high and the update is the least distracting to productivity.
4. Adoption Rates for New Apps
When introducing a new employee app, tracking the adoption rate is critical. This is the number of employees who have downloaded the app and are engaged with it online. A cloud-based company intranet can help with this important task..
It’s an industry best practice to give workers some notice before introducing any type of digital tool, introducing them to its features and benefits before the actual launch via important documents on an organization’s intranet. If adoption rates are low even after a well-planned rollout, having a data-driven content strategy to combat the trend with real-time KPIs can help.
5. Employee Feedback
Using features built into an intranet to encourage employees to ask questions and give their opinions about what is happening within the company is always a great place to start. Whether it’s a regular employee survey or commentary on specific pages, it’s important to facilitate two-way communication in addition to top-down and personalized company updates.
Insight often comes from unexpected places, so connecting frontline workers and others can yield outsized benefits in other areas of an organization like customer support, product and more.
6. Employee Turnover Rates
Employees who feel engaged at work are not likely to leave their job. For this reason, an important internal communication KPI to measure is employee turnover rate.
While this metric is hardly a function of internal communication professionals alone, it’s a good gauge for employee communication effectiveness overall and internal communications specialists frequently help move the needle on turnover.
7. Sales and Customer Satisfaction
If internal communications are working well, enterprises should see a corresponding increase in sales and customer satisfaction levels. Once employees have the information they need to do their work well, they can give the customers they are dealing with a much better experience.
As always, it’s important to recognize employees for their efforts and for reaching their goals with the company.
8. Employee Advocacy
Employees who are happy and engaged at work are more likely to take the next step to become brand advocates.
Adjusting internal communication strategy to encourage team members to repost company content on social media is becoming table stakes at many companies and can also serve as a good testing ground for external marketing messages.
9. Mobile Usage Rates
It’s important to determine not only how often team members are reading company content, but also where they are accessing it. We know that people are spending a lot of time looking down at their smartphones every day. For some people, this device is almost like an extension of their own body.
Tracking mobile-specific UX metrics can surface insights to optimize the employee experience.
10. Employee Profiles
Employee profiles allow team members to share details about their educational background, skills, and interests with their colleagues. When a photo is included with the profile, it helps to put a face to a name, especially in a large company.
To monitor employee engagement, consider measuring how completely each profile is filled out by all team members and whether they are updated regularly. Some elements of the profile will not change; however, employees can update their profile by changing their favorite quote or sharing something positive they like about working for the company.
How Does Internal Communication Motivate Employees?
When it comes to the wellbeing of your workforce, employee communications are your best friend. Not only do they have a positive impact on employee motivation, but they also improve employee happiness, loyalty and their mental health and wellbeing, too – because effective communications contribute to employees feeling trusted and respected. Organizations that treat people with respect and trust are significantly more successful than those that don’t – it’s just common sense, really!
Let’s take a look at five ways effective communication in the workplace improves employee wellbeing and motivation. Are there any areas where your organization could improve?
Relationships
Workplaces need effective relationships between colleagues, managers and departments in order to be successful. Effective communication between employees at all levels strengthens relationships and ensures everyone is on the same page. This creates a positive working environment, and improves both employee motivation and productivity, too.
To be effective when it comes to building and strengthening relationships, communication needs to be transparent and precise. Clarity is also crucial, because unclear communication can lead to expectations not being met, relationships being spoiled, and a breakdown of trust. All of this can result in demotivated and unhappy employees.
Innovation and creativity
Internal communication drives collaboration – when communication and information flows freely and openly between colleagues and those in other departments, it inspires efforts to collaborate, improves knowledge sharing, and gives employees access to other peoples’ skills that might help them do their job better.
Having a collaborative environment is one way to avoid getting a stressed-out workforce, so introducing an internal social media platform that allows people to connect is a great way to encourage collaboration – tools such as Slack, Trello, Basecamp and good old Google Docs are really effective for this.
Encouraging this type of collaboration not only improves that all-important staff communication, but can also empower employees to get the answers – to questions they may have, feedback or approval project approvals – they may need quickly and efficiently; meaning they can work smarter – not necessarily harder.
It’s also important to recognize that innovation in the workplace doesn’t always come from the top, either. Encouraging employees to submit useful ideas themselves helps your company thrive and take advantage of new opportunities.
Formalized employee ideas schemes generate hundreds of business improvement ideas, and feedback is an essential tool – but many companies fail to offer a well-structured means to submit ideas that will be taken seriously by decision makers.
An employee ideas scheme which includes status updates and feedback is an excellent way to encourage idea generation, recognizing the impact every individual can make to your business and improving employee motivation.
Decision-making
Giving employees an opportunity to get involved in making decisions has a significant positive effect on employee motivation. Studies tell us that managers who engage their employees in decision-making and problem-solving within day-to-day operations have more satisfied employees, with higher levels of productivity as their reward.
Involving employees in decision-making by explaining the issue and asking for their thoughts and ideas demonstrates to employees that their perspective and opinions are valued, and it can lead to solutions managers might not have considered.
However, managers need to ensure that they are providing meaningful opportunities for employees to participate in decision-making, rather than just paying lip service to it, or they could find that they’re having the opposite impact to what they were hoping for.
Information-sharing
Employees like to know what is happening within their organization, so it’s vital that employers have effective communication channels that reach all their employees. Sharing information with employees ensures that everyone is on the same page, and shares the same understanding of the company goals and vision.
Employers should share all appropriate information with employees unless it’s confidential – but care needs to be taken to avoid bombarding employees with information and contributing to information overload.
Career and personal development
The mental health of a workforce is linked to how engaged and motivated they are. After all, it’s well-known that career development opportunities are a significant contributor to employee motivation – but, if people know there’s nowhere to go, why bother even trying?
Effective communication and between employees and managers, and between managers and HR, helps managers and employees identify opportunities for career and personal development within the organization – meaning they can stay motivated and positive about their future.
Managers, employees and HR professionals need to work together to develop training programmes that improve employees’ skills and knowledge, whether that’s identifying secondment opportunities, training courses, or assigning a mentor.
HR professionals and managers need to understand the critical role communication in the workplace plays in employee motivation and staff well-being, and help facilitate better employee communications at all levels.
How Internal Communication Affects Customer Engagement?
A recent survey conducted by Salesforce.com entitled State of the Connected Customer, involved responses taken from more than 8,000 consumers and business buyers across the globe. Their findings included that 73% of customers had higher expectations from other companies after receiving an extraordinary experience with one company.
As you can see, customer engagement leaves quite an impact on your targeted audience.
Here is how internal communication can help you further the process of engaging your customers.
Shared Customer Knowledge
Internal communications amongst your various departments help improve the flow of information. This, in regards, helps in the transfer of knowledge to the point where all assimilated data becomes equally shared amongst your various departments, including sales, finance, marketing, and management.
Eventually, it allows everyone in your company to be on the same page down to every customer that you have dealt with in the past, managing during present times and looking forward to in the future. As such, customer knowledge becomes shared, and no matter where your customer goes from there onward, they are given the appropriate treatment as all of your departments understand your customers better and know how to deal with them properly.
Personalized Experiences
Tying in with the previous point we mentioned, as soon as customer knowledge becomes shared with all of your departments, your company will be able to cater to their needs at a more intimate level. Understanding their preferences, as well as the likes and dislikes of your customers, allows you to offer them a more personalized experience with your offered products and services.
Not only are you able to address their pain points and deliver viable solutions to them, but you are also able to address their concerns and issues in a way that is more adequate for them to comprehend.
Conflict Management
It is not all fun and games when it comes to dealing with customers. In fact, there are times when you have to deal with inadequacies on your part. Hence there can arise a time where conflicts between your team and your customers have to be managed in an expedient manner. Internal communication allows you to deal with them every step of the way.
Your approach to resolving their apprehensions becomes more holistic as you are able to see the bigger picture. With every department contributing and cooperating with each other to resolve the conflicts of your customers, you are able to apply much-improved conflict management to deal with any discrepancies that may have troubled your potential clients.
Deliver on Promises
In order to attract and appeal to your customers, you make promises towards them, and they have to be upheld at all times. Otherwise, you might lose all respect and credibility that you built around your offered products on services. Through internal communications, you can stay informed about your customers, their past activities, and interactions with your company.
Hence you are able to pinpoint their current standing with your organization, and this will allow your teams to follow up with the support your customer demands. In short, whatever promises you have made to them can be fulfilled more pleasantly, and any further confrontations can be avoided at all costs.
Time Management
Many companies focus on improving their time management skills to avoid any lags in their operations. With proper internal communications and established parameters, the steady flow of information between different departments of your workforce allows for improved time management.
Any interruptions and redundancies are removed from your operations, and every action that your teams commit becomes more standardized as a result. This allows customer support and services to improve as well, enabling you to resolve conflicts in real-time. This is also a similar approach used by professional writers when students approach to buy dissertation from them.
Improved Services
It goes without saying that internal communications allow your departments to offer customers a much more improved service than before. Your teams are able to respond better to their queries and offer them the solutions they are required to address concerns.
Your customers do not have to wait for your response much longer as all information about them is made available to your teams, and they are ready to offer assistance regarding their reservations. Customers are not only treated well but are also provided with the support needed by them to move along the chain of command without any unnecessary delays.
Satisfied Customers
Through proper internal communication, you are able to deliver much-improved customer services. This allows your customers to be much more satisfied with your services. Esteemed and valued customers are provided with the proper treatment from your teams, and there is a definite show of courtesy and respect.
Plus, if any new customers are joining your customer base, then they are provided with support along with proper enthusiasm from your departments to encourage long-term relationship building. Not only you strengthen your bonds with customers but also make sure that they are not given the slightest chance to complain about your offered products and services.
Satisfied Employees
Surprisingly when you treat customers well, it naturally builds esteem and confidence in your employees as well. Plus, who doesn’t like to please people? The happier your customers are with your offered products and service, the more satisfied your employees become as well.
The goodwill for your company is also nurtured, and with every happy customer comes a positive word of mouth for the way you treat them. All of this naturally inspires your team and workers to deliver to the best of their abilities and keep the energy going without any interruptions in between. Lastly, the praise and applaud customers make towards your company also uplifts the morale of your team and makes them feel more motivated.
What are the Benefits of Having Strong Internal Communication Strategy?
Effective team communications can make your cultural foundation stronger – with the right communications strategy, the team’s ability to foresee and respond to problems can be vastly improved. By engaging with your team members, employee engagement and retention also increase.
These are just a few reasons why a brand should consider implementing clearly planned and structured internal communication strategies.
Faster Response Time to Problems and Emergencies
Here’s an experience most of us can relate to. You’re working on a specific task when something goes wrong. You rush into a co-worker’s office and begin talking excitedly, in detail, about what needs to be done. The response on your co-worker’s face isn’t one of approval or disapproval. It’s something far worse: “Huh?”
Having a clear process for connecting the entire team to the right information at the right time helps stop issues from becoming much bigger problems. When something inevitably goes wrong, a fleshed-out communications strategy enables the entire team to respond quickly. No one has to be caught up on the issue.
Read Also: Interpersonal Communication
Often, the worst time to get an employee up to speed is when something goes awry. There’s high tension, and moving parts are moving too quickly. Effective team communication stops this problem before it starts and creates better communication across the board.
Make Employees Feel Valued
One-way flows of information can only get a team halfway to its goals. Feedback loops need to be embraced. And feedback can take many forms. 360 team performance reviews, where someone reviews (and is reviewed by) a co-worker, manager, and a reporting employee, are just one example out of the many resources available. Internal communication channels create safe, encouraging environments in which people feel free to share their ideas.
If there’s limited opportunity for verbal communication, a comprehensive communications strategy can help make employees feel valued and show them that their ideas matter. Their bosses are listening; they have attention and respect. And since their ideas matter, they break out of thinking that they’re just a cog in a machine. They become much happier for it, and happy employees are 12% more productive.
Increase Employee Contribution
In 2015, only 32% of employees were engaged at work. The Harvard Business Review discusses how improving employee engagement affects productivity, increasing it by as much as 22%. Employees who feel more valued are more likely to be engaged and to contribute more to the project, team, and company as a whole.
Reduce Retention Issues
The Harvard Business Review also reports that employees who were more engaged are much less likely to look somewhere else for employment. With a digital communications strategy in place, even engaging remote workers is within your wheelhouse. In fact, when companies with high turnover problems took steps to increase engagement, turnover dropped by 25%. In low turnover companies, the reduction was 65%.
More engagement and reduced turnover lead to a more experienced team and fewer precious resources being spent on rehiring and retraining employees. This level of retention is ultimately reflected across the entire organization as employees benefit from an established team rather than one stuck in a cycle of hiring and training.
Better Informed, More Capable Leaders
Communication failures tend to start at the top. With a solid internal communications strategy, organizations can accomplish much more than an improved flow of information. Team leaders who utilize modern team communication tools have their fingers on the pulse of what their employees are thinking and working on.
This provides strong situational awareness and a keen grasp of employees’ strengths and weaknesses while eliminating the gaps that resulted in poor communication in the first place. It also puts managers in a better position to respond to current and future problems, or even to head problems off before they occur.
Improved Ability to Set and Achieve Goals
Common goals must be identified before they can be reached. As any team progresses towards its goals, it will inevitably make mistakes and learn. As a result of these positive and adverse events, those goals will evolve and change. Without proper identification and continuous adaptation, you’ll be trying to hit a moving target while blindfolded.
Solid internal communication (this includes remote team members) means everyone knows what they are working towards at any given moment. Fluid group communication between employees, managers, and executives results in increased productivity and builds a stronger and in-sync team that thrives off of clearer communication and a higher sense of mutual respect.
