S3 E109 – Clarify Communications Channels

S3 E109: Clarify Communications Channels


In this episode of the For Love of Team podcast, Winston Faircloth delves into Chapter Seven of his new book, 'Team Love: 28 Ways to Demonstrate Caring at Work,' titled 'Clarify Communication Channels.' Winston narrates the challenges of managing multiple communication platforms and the chaos it can bring, using a relatable scenario of miscommunication and lost information. He shares practical strategies to streamline communication within a team, such as setting intentions for email usage, leveraging company tools, and minimizing interruptions to protect productive time. Winston provides a step-by-step approach to enhance clarity and efficiency in team communications, ensuring that technology serves the team's needs. Listeners are encouraged to adopt these methods to improve their organizational communication and overall team performance. 

00:00 Introduction to Season Three 

00:28 Introducing Chapter Seven: Clarify Communication Channels 

02:14 The Chaos of Communication 

03:07 Strategies for Streamlining Communication 

06:18 Practical Steps for Better Communication 

08:37 Conclusion and Next Steps 

#TeamLOVE Book. Join the bold book writing journey as we write and share our first draft chapters from our upcoming book - Team Love: 28 Ways to Demonstrate Caring at Work here in season 3 of the For Love of Team podcast.

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Transcript

Judith: Welcome to season three of the For Love of Team podcast. 

This season, we are taking you behind the curtain as Winston Faircloth writes his new book, Team Love, 28 Ways to Demonstrate Caring at Work. Each week, we will share excerpts from a new chapter, including key concepts and takeaways to help you support your team as a visionary leader. 

In this episode, host Winston Faircloth introduces Chapter Seven: Clarify Communication Channels. 

Winston Faircloth: Chapter 7, Clarify Communications Channels. It's 7:30 in the morning, getting ready for a meeting with our board chair. The revenue forecast is tight, and we're about to head out to the office to deliver the news in person. We are going to need a miracle to hit our targets. Need to share some bright spots too, but cannot seem to remember where that bit of information is about a promising new prospect. 

The one that was going to help us surpass our next big milestone. Is this right? I'm trying to remember. Mark said he met with their new CEO at the chamber meeting...she wanted more information about our upcoming launch and she had another company in mind that had the same challenges as she did. Boy, landing one or both of these prospects would help us close our gap. 

Now what did I do with that information? Let's see. Did Mark send me an email about this? Nope. A private team's chat? Not there. Voicemail? Empty. Back of the napkin on the top of my dresser? Hopefully not. Text? Oh my, searching through all of these will take forever. Ugh, Needle, say hi to Haystack.  

Not only is searching for missing information extremely frustrating, but it also wastes precious time. 

There's so many options today for our team members to communicate with one another, and everyone has their favorite way to share information as well. Carl sends emails every weekend and most evenings. Amy is a Teams champion. She pings me with direct messages. Mark uses text and sometimes catches me in the hallway with updates. 

And where is that document? Is it in the S drive under Q4 Prospect?  

Have you seen my inbox lately? There are 327 unread messages. No wonder team communications feel so chaotic. Well, there is a path from chaos to clarity. And that begins with having conversations with your leadership team about being more intentional about how and when we use our communications channels. 

Without setting intentions about how we use email, for example, many of our team members may have their inbox open all day long in a side window. Notification chimes greet every new arrival, taking their attention away from more important tasks- feeling the need to set something aside to handle the latest, greatest, urgent response. 

And with every interruption, did you know it takes on average 20 minutes to get back into the flow of our work? Coordinating with a remote team member? How can you tell if you're in the middle of deep work? It is just so confusing, and so many different channels lead us into so many different ways of retrieving information. 

One former client of mine assigned a primary way of using their technology tools to streamline communication channels. For example, with email, they agreed that emails did not require immediate response. For internal purposes, emails were helpful for additional context and background for further discussion and explanation. 

And with respect to both internal and external emails, their goal was to respond by the end of the business day or within 24 business hours; immediate response, in other words, was not expected. If an issue required greater urgency, this team then elected to use the company's messaging app and not private text to contact their colleague to send a quick question or update. 

If they were in a meeting, that notification shows up in their feed after it's over. Messages are short, often to answer a direct question or set up a time to discuss. Again, even messaging app is not requiring an immediate response. It says, are you interruptible? Can I connect with you? And since this organization works across multiple time zones, they use phone calls for Hair on Fire requests. 

Now sometimes , even with that, the other person is in a meeting or on another line. Leaving voicemail and them using transcription services is a game changer. And in extreme situations with hair on fire, calling twice in a row provides a signal that the other person needs to pick up... as soon as possible.  

Now, this is not a perfect system, but what it has done is reduce the time team members are on email every day, and it has provided ways to check in with others to see if they can connect internally to solve other issues throughout the day. What do you think of this approach? How would it work in your organization? 

So for further action... 

Number one: take an inventory of the numerous ways you communicate with one another internally using both company provided tools as well as personal channels. Number two is now leaving it to individual preference is the pathway to communication chaos. Deciding, intentionally, how you want to use company tools makes an enormous difference. And by the way, from a legal perspective, you may want to discourage the use of personal channels for communicating with your team members, because it could bring their personal devices and their personal chats into a legal discovery process. 

Number three: protect productive time by limiting email use to items that can be responded to by the end of the business day, 24 hours later, or whatever interval you decide. Fourth: design a process where team members are empowered to join into messages and channels when they are available. In other words, if a team's message comes through or team's channel response is posted, they can get to it when they are available, but also provide a channel for the truly urgent requests as they may arise. 

And in our example, two phone calls back to back was the ultimate urgent response requested. And then number five: protect team members' personal time. If you feel the need to compose emails on your time, use the schedule later option or save it in a draft folder to send emails during normal business hours. 

Now, all of this is about allowing technology to work for you and the team, not the other way around. By streamlining your communication channels and enabling other technology like CRM, you can increase the speed of information retrieval and reduce the time being wasted by interruptions. Taking that needle out of the haystack and having a process -your way of doing communications within your organization. 

Judith: Thanks, Winston!  

We invite you to share your feedback and biggest takeaways on our website at for love of team dot com slash blog and look for today’s chapter episode. 

Thanks for listening.  

Remember that by loving our people who love our customers, your visionary leadership comes to life.  

We hope to see you next time on the For Love of Team podcast.