Management for Beginners - Open Communication

Excellent communication ability is essential for success in any role, but there are skills and techniques that, as a manager, you need to use more so than when you were a worker.

These are communicating with team members and communicating with people outside your team. Active listening is essential if you are to be an excellent communicator. But unfortunately, when you are a manager, it can be easy to think that you know all the answers and that listening is less critical because you've thought of a solution already – that, of course, would be a huge mistake.

The best form of communication is when it is transparent and open, creating a framework of honesty, directness, and frankness, characterized by sharing of experiences, trust and a willingness to embrace conflict and collaborative problem-solving. It engages team members to discover newer or improved ways of reaching goals and prevents groupthink whilst spurning innovation.

Communication is the basis of all healthy relationships, including the one between a team member and a manager. For example, team members whose managers hold regular meetings with them are almost three times as likely to be engaged as team members whose managers do not hold regular meetings with them. Engagement is highest among team members who have some form (face-to-face, phone or digital) of daily communication with their managers. And when team members attempt to contact their manager, engaged team members report their manager returns their calls or messages within 24 hours. 

Team members need to be encouraged to accept critical feedback and provide constructive input to others. Feedback should answer questions, provide solutions, or help strengthen the task or project at hand. You cannot have a high-performance team without strong relationships and genuine communication. The two traits are closely linked.  

These traits are essential for high-performance teams because, without honest communication and the strength of the relationships that follow, it becomes near impossible to fix problems with performance. Strong and open relationships allow team members to talk honestly about successes and failures areas for improvement and without fear of animosity. Open communication requires a free flow of information, a shared agreement that no subject is off-limits, and frequent and respectful interactions among team members and other individuals in the organization.

Genuine conversations

Genuine conversations are about performance, with the intent of helping team members improve. It takes time and much effort to develop an environment of mutual trust and respect that creates a safe environment for genuine conversations. This can be a daunting process for some, but once you are comfortable with genuine conversations, you will never regret it. Helped by shifting your perception to a view that the conversation is about caring for your team member and helping them to improve, the process becomes second nature. The ability to have genuine conversations is what builds strong relationships, and the stronger your relationships, the more open communication becomes. This is important as high-performance teams seek outside connections that enhance their creativity and innovation, satisfying their need for fresh perspectives and information.

How to become a good communicator

Being a good manager means being an excellent communicator, ensuring that the right message reaches the right person in the right way at the right time. Communication is not a one-way interaction; it is two-way, like listening. Just doing the talking does not help; you need to concentrate on listening as well, which takes mental effort.

Actions

1.     First, actively listen to what the other person is saying. (Focus hard on the words they are saying, do not interrupt or frame an answer in your mind until they have finished speaking.)

2.     Rehearsing in your head the message you want to tell.

3.     Putting yourself in the other person's shoes, how will they interpret the message?

4.     Is the message clear, concise, and unlikely to be misinterpreted?

5.     If it is misinterpreted, how will you back out?

6.     Often if someone has a difficult thing to say to you, they will disguise it, it will not be obvious, or they will not be concise; you need to be on the lookout for this.

7.     If the message (such as an employee's termination) is sensitive or unpleasant, prepare a bulleted script for yourself to follow and stick to it.

8.     Be frank, direct, open, and honest; the other person will pick this up and be reassured by it. It's a matter of not what you have to say but rather how you say it.

9.     Check that your messages have been received by asking the team member to playback to you their understanding of what you have said.

10.  Look directly at the other person that is, into their eyes. To do this and maintain a stare, look just above the bridge of their nose, between their eyes. This allows you to maintain a direct look for as long as you want. To the other person, it appears as if you are looking directly into their eyes. This is an especially effective tactic for negotiations, and when delivering bad news, it gives you the upper hand.

Summary

1.     Active listening. - Is essential if you are to be an excellent communicator. But unfortunately, when you are a manager, it can be easy to think that you know all the answers and that listening is less critical because you've thought of a solution already – that, of course, would be a huge mistake.

2.     Become a good communicator. - Being a good manager means being an excellent communicator, ensuring that the right message reaches the right person in the right way at the right time.

3.     Be frank, direct, open, and honest. - The other person will pick this up and be reassured by it. It's a matter of not what you have to say but rather how you say it.

Management and TeamsRussell FutcherManagement for Beginners