With organisations going through multiple changes every year, at pace and often at the same time, providing clarity for employees being affected by change through clear and regular communication is key. In fact, businesses with effective comms strategies are 3.5x more likely to outperform their competitors.
In fact, businesses with effective comms strategies are 3.5x more likely to outperform their competitors.
Communication is as much about how people feel as it is about what they know. If an employee understands why a change is happening, what it will entail and how it will benefit them and the business, they’re far more likely to feel positively towards and be engaged with the initiative – driving its success. And yet, our research found that just 30% of HR leaders consider communication to be a top priority when implementing change, while 1 in 5 said they don’t have a targeted communications plan for transformation programmes.
It’s no surprise then that Oak Engage found that nearly 1 in 3 employees surveyed felt they hadn’t received the necessary information to understand change and that it hadn’t been communicated clearly. If business leaders aren’t utilising a comprehensive communications strategy during times of uncertainty, they’ll struggle to generate buy-in from their people – stymying the potential success of their initiatives.
After all, you can’t be an effective leader if you can’t effectively communicate.
Using communication to overcome our natural response to change
When faced with major upheaval and uncertainty, human beings will naturally experience increased anxiety and fear, a reduced ability to rationalise, impaired performance and heightened emotion. Which is why it’s extremely important for business leaders to speak to the emotional state of their employees when communicating decisions around transformation and change.
For communications to land with impact and relevance, leaders must understand their employees’ perspective and everything that’s going on in their world at that point – utilsing emotional intelligence and empathy to ensure messages are received in the right way. In turn, employees will feel far more trusting of their employer and willing to embrace change with a positive mindset.
The barriers to effective communication
That being said, communication isn’t always straightforward. There are multiple blockers and noise makers that make communicating with impact a challenging prospect, including:
Noise: With increasingly demanding workloads and busy personal lives, human beings only have so much capacity for new information. If key decisions are communicated poorly – through a generalised mass email, for example – it’s highly likely it’ll get lost in the noise.
Attitudes: Human beings are emotional creatures and make decisions with our heart, not our head. If leaders focus too much on detail and logic when communicating change, they’ll lose the attention of their workforce and fail to generate significant engagement with their initiative.
Hybrid world: In today’s hybrid work environment, leaders are increasingly reliant on tech to broadcast important messages to the masses, expecting managers to add relevance at a local/team level. But if managers aren’t sufficiently informed themselves, a disparity between what employees know and what leaders think they know will create a rift.
So, if you’d like to find out how to cut through the noise and communicate key decisions with your people in the most effective way possible, watch our latest on-demand webinar.
