Effective Communication

Communication is vital to every company’s success.  Regardless of your role, or the size of the organization in which you work, communication either makes or breaks your ultimate success.  Communication channels are constantly changing, adding to the complexity of this all-important skill.  Let’s take a look at how this breaks down.

If you are the CEO, you must clearly communicate to your entire organization what the goals and success criteria are for the strategic path of the company.  If everyone on your team knows where you are going, then each of them can apply that to their daily objectives.  You then must communicate to each of the members of your leadership team what their role is to play in that overall strategy.

Leaders in an organization from the top all the way down to the front-line managers must be able to effectively communicate in two directions.  First, they have to take the big picture and turn that into a tactical plan that their team can work on in order to help the company as a whole accomplish the strategic objective.  They also must understand the personal goals of those on their team, and provide career paths to those who excel in their current positions.

Individual contributors also have a responsibility to understand the strategy plus their tactical role in the overall plan.  In addition, they need to be able to work with their peers and leaders to insure that as the goals evolve, proper adjustments are made.  Finally, they need to communicate with leadership about their long term goals and objectives for their careers and lives.

It all sounds simple, but personalities and politics tend to jam the whole thing up sometimes.  We struggle to get it right all the time.  Usually, it can be corrected as the organization moves forward, but we’ve seen tons of examples of businesses failing due to, at its core, poor communication.

However, there are times where communication becomes very critical, and must be done right.  Typically these times come when something is wrong.  When a customer is having an issue with your product or service, effective communication with that person is critical to resolving their issue and retaining them as a loyal customer.  It is also critical to get the right people in your organization engaged quickly in order to resolve the issue as soon as possible.  Other times when this is critical include disasters due to weather, earthquakes, fire, or civil unrest.  Any time the lives of your team are in danger, the right communication strategy must be employed effectively and without delay.

Internal communication is extremely important, as illustrated above.  However, the outside world sees you and your company through the lens of communications you publicly and privately release.  These days, it’s not just the marketing department, sales, and customer support that make or break your reputation.  Every word you say, email, post, or otherwise express can ultimately impact the overall view of your team.

If you know me, you know that I just so happen to work for a company that provides a communication platform that solves many of the things listed above for companies large and small around the globe.  xMatters’ solutions work every day at delivering those critical communications addressed above.  But, regardless of how you handle communications, from setting the strategic vision as a CEO, down to teamwork and coordination at the individual contributor level – remember that how and what you communicate will ultimately impact the success you achieve.