“Discover the Art of Team Communication and see your Team's Morale Improve”

The art of team communication

Effective team communication comes down to a few key considerations

Repeat your key messages 100 times in 100 ways
Validate the effectiveness of your communication
Don’t over use email
Communication is for task and for purpose

Repeat Your Key Messages

How much of what you tell your people do you think they will remember? …… well on a good day you should expect about 80% of people to remember about 20% of everything you tell them, and you should expect there to be a number of people who misunderstood your key messages.

Some managers think that they can increase their people’s recall by getting them to sign a copy of the communication. This does not work.

So how do you ensure that your key messages get through to your people?

Your people will remember messages that are persistently repeated in

team meetings
one on ones
corridor conversations/informal meetings
email
newsletters, and
on your company communication board, and
through your actions, or
during your MBWA

Effective communication is about repeating your key messages 100 times in 100 ways, It is the persistent repetition of the same messages over time that will result in effective communication.

Validate your people’s understanding

Who is responsible for the effectiveness of your communication? (you are)

Communication is one of the more complex functions of leadership. For a whole host of reasons what you think you said and what your people heard are often completely different. So, to verify the effectiveness of your communication it can be a good idea to validate your peoples understanding.

You can validate your peoples understanding by

organizing a simple quiz,
using a communication survey, or
simply by walking around a chatting to people to find out what they understood your key messages to be

By checking in on how your communication effectiveness is you will know what you need to change in your communication to ensure that your communication is effective.

Don’t overuse email

Tips to make email more effective

Use common header with a title that relates to the content of the email such as

“Process Update” | “Customer Feedback” | “Breaking News”

Keep your messages brief (concise)
Clearly state your emotion, only use email for positive emotions
Use it to reinforce your key messages only
If you forward an email as a FYI – take the time to add a note explaining why you are forwarding it on

Team Communication is for task and for purpose

When you employ someone to fill a vacancy you are employing them to do more then just their job, ideally you are employing them to be a part of something great, your organization!

The information that is required for someone to do their job is far less than the information that they require to feel like they are a meaningful part of your organization. As a leader you need to provide your employees with significantly more information than they need to do their job.

As a leader you need to create a sense of purpose for your people, providing reason and context for their work. Then there is our innate need” to know what is going on around us, so let your people know what other parts of your business are doing, only then will they feel like a part of the business.

One mistake managers often make is assuming that their people do not need some of the available information, such as your business plans. Which logically is true, surely the customer service people don’t need to know what your business plans are to be able to serve your customers. Though, if you do share the information about your business plans your people will serve the customer with a little bit more energy and enthusiasm. They do so because they now have a sense of purpose.

So next time you think that your people do not need a piece of information to do their job, ask yourself “would this information give my staff a greater sense of purpose, provide them with more meaning or appeal to their curiosity?” if so then let pass the information on.

Common Team Communication Mistakes

Too much communication in email
Leaders assuming their people don’t need to know about some things
Leaders assume their message got through
Leaders not listening to their staff

Managing People Tips: More Great Links

Discover everything you want to know about managing people, click through on any of the links below

Team communication can be very challenging for a manager. However, a leader who engages their people to improve their team communication will inevitable succeed.

To discover more about managing people, click here and return from team communication to our supervision and team leadership home page.