Running a business successfully is not an easy task, especially in today’s highly competitive markets. Most organizations will agree that certain factors like the business idea, leadership skills, adaptability, marketing strategy, etc. determine the success of their business.
There’s one more important factor that contributes significantly to the overall success but usually put at the back burner by many organizations is communication. However, underestimating the role of communication means compromising with the prosperity of a business.
Communication is key to a business’s growth and eventually to its long-term success. What we achieve working as a team largely depends on how we communicate with each other. This type of communication that happens between the people within the organization is known as internal communications (IC).
However, there’s one more communication common to almost all the businesses and is known as external communication. In general, external communication occurs between the members of the organization and the people outside the organization, including clients, prospects, vendors, and investors.
Both internal and external communication plays a pivotal role in driving the organization towards success.
As an employee of an organization, you will certainly agree with the fact that a significant amount of your time is spent daily communicating with other people at work. Whether it’s sharing ideas with your team, preparing plans to deal with unpredicted situations, training recruits, or handling customer queries, you need to communicate properly to make sure things move in the right direction.
It goes without saying that communication is a key factor that decides the effectiveness of almost all business activities.
“Communication works for those who work at it,” as a John Powell quote goes.
Let’s proceed further to know more about communication in the workplace.
Things That You Always Need to Avoid in a Conversation
Effective communication not only demands you to talk but also listen carefully so that you can easily understand what others want to tell you.
Well, listening is the most important thing that makes a conversation productive. Always keep in mind that a good listener is also a good speaker.
You can always work to enhance your listening skills and use other tips to make communication at the workplace more effective. However, you also need to pull yourself away from doing the following common mistakes that are likely to ruin conversations:
Not paying attention to what other people are saying
Lack of attention means that either your listening skills are not good or you have a tough day and you are finding it difficult to focus. In the latter case, you can avoid conversations with people during the busy working hours of the day.
Every word becomes a reason to argue
A conversation becomes meaningless and destructive if more efforts are put on arguing rather than understanding. If an argument starts from your side for every word in a conversation, it means that you are trying to force your point of view on other people in the conversation. This can happen when the emotions overpower the purpose of conversation and you need to respect the emotions and feelings of others to get over such situations.
No action at the end of a conversation
Almost all conversations demand some kind of action at its end. If you are not taking action after a conversation, it means that you are not bothered by the concerns of other people. For instance, if a co-worker tells you that the tools your team is using are not good enough, then you should take action to look into the matter and forward the issue to the management.
Backlashing at someone talking to you
Even when you completely disagree with the thought or suggestion of a person, you should never backlash. Backlashing not only ends a conversation but also the person may not communicate openly with you in the future. Thus, you need to handle things graciously and politely tell them that you are not agreeing to their thoughts.
Expectations From You When You Communicate - As a Team Member
Communicating with your colleagues requires you to use appropriate channels and tools to communicate with your fellow team members.
For instance, if you are working in a traditional office environment, then you should be able to interact with your colleagues over face-to-face meetings and written media like reports, memos, etc. On the other hand, as a remote worker, you need to utilize audio/video conferences, instant messaging tools, project management software, etc. to stay in touch with your teammates.
You need to keep your ego and differences with someone at bay to make sure that you have a productive discussion with colleagues.
Also, you have to make sure that you put constant efforts to improve your communication skills.
As a Team Leader or Manager
Being a team leader or a project manager, it can be challenging but you need to ensure two-way communication with both the management and your team.
You not only have to relay the information to teams that you received from executives but also let management know the issues that your team is facing.
As you are managing and representing a team, it’s your responsibility to ensure that no miscommunication arises between your team and the people at the management level.
Along with using the right communication tools, you will need to maintain cordial relationships with each individual you are dealing with.
Why You Always Need To Look Out For Ways to Improve Communication at the Workplace
With over a decade of experience in handling multiple teams for my organization, I can tell you that there’s always room for improvement when it comes to communication.
You can experiment with your organization’s communication strategies and use the latest technologies to help people at the workplace to communicate effectively.
Now, you might be wondering why there is a need to constantly refine communication strategies?
And, what are the advantages that you and your organization will get by realizing effective communication?
Well, building a solid communication framework means that following things become evident in your organization:
Stronger Relationships
Communication is the fundamental entity for building strong relationships with people, even in the corporate setting. Regular interactions with colleagues and clients help you to strengthen your professional relationship with the people you are working/dealing with. Moreover, having a strong bond with someone means that there are high levels of trust and mutual understanding. Building good professional relationships helps you collaborate and achieve your team goals successfully.
Better Employee Management
For managers who can communicate with their team in a good way can easily disseminate information among them. A manager, without any hesitation, can make people on the team aware of their responsibilities and even correct them if things do not move in the right direction. Ultimately, good communication makes the management of employees easier for managers.
Constructive Feedback
Feedback can help people at work to know their strengths and weaknesses. As an active worker within an organization, you may get feedback from your co-workers or clients. This feedback can help you to identify the areas that you need to improve. However, it is important to understand that feedback is possible only if you and the person giving the feedback are comfortable talking to each other. Also, channels through which feedback moves back and forth can be the same as that used for general communication.
Higher Productivity
Effective communication in an organization means that there’s a natural flow of ideas and thoughts among the employees. You and other members of the team can openly discuss the new ideas and may come up with something innovative. Moreover, employees feel valued when their thoughts are considered by others. As a result, they try and give their best in each task. All these things collectively boost the productivity of people and they tend to achieve more in less time.
Faster Growth of the Company
An organization tends to grow when all the people working for it are aligned with the goals of the business. Strong communication allows team members to know exactly what they need to do and how to achieve their objectives as a team. Moreover, by having productive discussions in place, it is possible to devise or modify strategies to accomplish business goals faster.
Role of Communication in Virtual/Remote Teams
Communication becomes even more important for teams that are working remotely and do not want team productivity to suffer. The managers of remote teams need to choose flexible communication tools that can meet the needs of all the members on the team.
For instance, some team members may only need a simple messaging tool to interact with one another, while others may have to connect via. video or audio calls and need to share their screens with their colleagues.
Thus, it is the responsibility of the manager to decide if multiple tools are required for their team to communicate and collaborate efficiently.
Special emphasis must be given to set up strong lines of communication among the members of a remote team.
Conclusion
To sum it up, organizations working in any business vertical need to understand that communication is key to their success. Thus, they have to take all the necessary steps to promote effective communication among the people working for the organization. Also, as an individual employee, you need to put efforts to realize productive conversations with colleagues and people outside the organization.