Communication in Leadership

What does Communication mean to you?

One management training exercise I’ll never forget is called “Chinese Whispers”. The setup is simple: one person whispers a short phrase to the next, who whispers it on, until it circles back to the original speaker. By the end, the phrase is usually unrecognisable.

It’s a funny dinner game, but it’s no joke in a team or boardroom. Even with just six people, messages shift dramatically. With 18, the distortion beggars belief. I once assumed that  everyone understood my message, only to find that there are several interpretations to “do it when you can.”

I thought I was giving the team space as the task was needed, but not urgently. A team member who suffered from anxiety stayed on late that day to get it done, whereas another person didn’t do it until I gave a deadline - he took it to mean not urgent and not important.

The overriding challenge was best worded by George Bernard Shaw: “The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.” 

Communication remains one of the biggest obstacles getting in the way of teams and organisations reaching their potential. From experience, this comes down to just three factors: the amount of information, the timing of the communication and the channel of communication.

How much Information should Leaders Share?

The answer lies in the context. A new operations manual will invariably be a pretty hefty chunk of information. On the other hand if you wish to share feedback then keep it short and to the point. The principle I like to use here (and in other areas of leadership) is as much as necessary, as little as possible.

Being authentic at work means being transparent, but that does not mean a leader should burden a junior with their worries. Without masking the truth, you only need to share enough information for the other person to get their task done effectively.

In the context of delegating work to another person, it depends on their experience. With a very new team member you might need to give lots of information as part of training, go through different scenarios and use storytelling to reinforce values. With an experienced person who enjoys more autonomy, you might simply need to explain what result you expect, be clear on what ‘good looks like’ and let them deliver.

Timing: the Often Overlooked Communication Skill

While you cannot find a perfect moment for everything, there are some aspects of timing that are crucial in communication. Obviously if something is urgent, handle it immediately. Feedback is also best served warm, when the action, context and words are fresh in the mind. It’s both unfair and unprofessional to address someone weeks after the event. Unfortunately I’ve been on both sides of such a conversation and I can’t forget the sinking feeling when I realised what I was doing as a leader.

Sharing big company announcements that may leave people unsettled might be better left for the afternoon (assuming normal office hours) so that they have some time to process and speak to their leaders, rather than going home anxious for a sleepless night .

Announcing that new operations manual is a task to handle with care. Since you know it’s coming up, you have time to plan. You can start to warm people up to idea, hopefully you even requested their input towards the new processes. It’s not just a case of dumping a 100-page document on people on Friday afternoon and telling them to ‘confirm they have read and understood the contents of bla bla boring.’

Which leads us nicely to the next factor.

Choosing the Right Channel of Communication

With hindsight, I think this is where I got it wrong most often. The effectiveness of your communication largely depends on the channel used, such as a face-to-face discussion, video call, text chat or email. It is so dangerously easy to use the wrong one. The various channels all have situations where they are precisely the correct tool to use, but other times they totally fall short.

It’s comfortable to resort to a written message - you can do this in your time and space. However some communications really need to be handled live on a phone or video call, if not in person. If it’s a tough message, or there may be any ambiguity or lack of clarity (perhaps due to language barriers or cultural differences) then you want to talk live and ask the recipient to repeat back what they’ve understood.

“Over the years, I’ve come to realise that communication is not about what I say. It’s more about what others take away from it.”

Case Study: Communicating a New Operations Manual

Back to that new operations manual. You know that if you just issue it, no one has the time to read it. Yet it’s a critical document to your production or service delivery, contains a wealth of knowledge and experience accumulated over the years and through painful lessons learned. If you really want your team to benefit from it, call a meeting. Go through the manual, not page by page, but at least cover each section. 

Prepare examples that perfectly illustrate how the client journey should flow - and not just straightforward cases. Invite the team to consider different scenarios and help them see how the manual provides the way forward, in principle if not to the letter. Continue these meetings until your team start to answer their own questions.

That’s when you know they’ve really understood the document and why they will rely on it. Yes, it takes a lot longer than circulating by email or in your Teams/Slack/etc but just keep two things in mind. One: how much time you will save when your team is more empowered and does not need you for every answer; and two: remember the pain, cost and waste of effort when things go wrong.

Final Thought: a Communication Challenge for You

Over the years, I’ve come to realise that communication is less about what I say. It’s more about what others actually understand, and what they take away from it.

Here’s a challenge for you: ask your team members to repeat back individually what they understood from your last communication. How closely does it match your intention?

Thank you for reading this far. If any of this resonates, I’d love to welcome you as a reader and to stay connected. Please join the mailing list for future posts, share your thoughts in the comments, or find me on LinkedIn.