If you’ve ever been in charge of managing a small team that’s tackling an important initiative, you know how difficult communications can be. Communications become even more difficult in a large corporation because of all the different departments, priorities, and leaders.
When you’re preparing communications for a corporate setting, it’s important to be thoughtful and strategic to ensure your communications resonate.
Here are some common corporate communications challenges, and how to overcome them:
Your employees receive so many daily emails that they miss the important ones. People read an average of 120-150 emails a day in a corporate setting. This is not only taxing on the mind but can cause issues if an important email is missed in the sea of day-to-day updates and follow-ups. To avoid this, cut back on the mass emails you send on a daily and weekly basis, and notify employees of what is most important. You can also try alternative forms of communication, such as text or group chat websites like Slack to lessen the email burden.
Your employees don’t understand the context and therefore ignore important information. You may assume that all of your employees are in the loop, but this is not always the case. If someone receives an email or message they can’t understand, most will ignore it rather than investigate further. It’s unlikely they will speak up for fear of seeming oblivious or inattentive to their job. Make sure every email or announcement has an appropriate amount of background information to make sure everyone is on board.
Industry jargon is not understood by all employees. Not all employees will have a strong foundation of technical terms in your industry, but few will speak up if there is something they don’t know. Remember, not all employees have been working in your industry for years, and even if they have, they may not be familiar with all the different terms. Cut the jargon and deliver your messages in a clear, easy-to-understand manner.
A corporate crisis reaches the media before you have communicated it to your staff. This may sound obvious, but corporate crises need to be addressed within the company before it becomes public knowledge. Employees do not want to feel like secrets are being kept from them, and they need to know how to respond to questions from the media or customers. Even if the news is hard to share, you need to be honest with your staff so they are prepared.
Employees either receive too much information or not enough. There is a fine balance between keeping teams informed and bombarding them with information they do not need. Choose your communications methods and timing carefully. For example, use company message boards to share big initiatives, and use email for smaller, more targeted updates.
Corporate communications can be difficult to implement. Contact Tucker/Hall for ideas on how to make your corporate communications as effective as possible.
