Open Communication
Communication, through both formal and informal channels, is the lifeblood of any organization. In reading about communication environments, channels, processes, systems, and hierarchies, we sometimes lose sight of the essence of the communication act: it is profoundly human. At the center of every organization are people held together by slender threads of cooperation. These threads are maintained by people sharing information with each other. The result is a delicate network of human relationships linked through communication.
In these networks, information is a commodity. It has value, can be exchanged, and is crucial to the success of launching a project, selling a product, or marketing a service. Unfortunately, people sometimes refuse to exchange this crucial information. They often erect barriers to shut out others in situations they consider hostile. Most communication mishaps in organizations can be traced to these barriers. They impede information exchange and thereby disrupt the orderly flow of activity.
Often these barriers, resulting in a closed communication climate, cause lost business, damaged reputations, endangered goodwill, and general unhappiness. Research shows that an open communication climate is desirable because it enhances human relationships, which occasion increased morale and productivity.
In an open climate, employees feel free to express opinions, voice complaints, and offer suggestions to their superiors. Employees talk freely among themselves about important policy decisions and their production, personnel, or marketing concerns. Information passes without distortion upward, downward, and horizontally throughout the organization. Research shows that this open communication climate has at least three distinct characteristics: it is supportive, participative, and trusting.
In supportive environments, employees convey information to superiors without hesitation, confident that superiors will readily accept it, whether good or bad, favorable or unfavorable.
In participative environment, Employees have to feel that what they say counts for something. The best suggestions for improving production processes, for example, come from employees who work everyday on the assembly line. Sales people know what the customers want because they are in daily contact. Customer service representatives are acquainted firsthand with the technical and functional problems that can spell future marketing disasters. All these employees have valuable information that must be shared with the organization's decision makers. The information will be shared if employees feel management regards them as legitimate participants in the enterprise. Employees know they are valued participants when their suggestions are implemented, their questions answered, and their concerns recognized.
Trusting Environments
All parties in information exchange must tell the truth as they perceive it. They must also ensure that information is correct. Credibility is any employee's greatest asset. A reputation for carelessness, lying, deceit, or manipulation undercuts all future messages. The result of credibility is trust; it underpins all human relationships. Employees have to believe their information sources.
If communication flows unhindred with minimal distortion to the bottom of the organisation pyramid, that is when trust is build and with Trust comes the attitude of carins and sharing. This is what every organisation needs - TCS (Trust Care and Share) to reach the level of excellence.
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