According to the American Psychology Association Survey, 25% of American employees seldom trust their employees. The more disturbing fact from this research is that 50% of them feel this lack of trust is affecting their productivity. They claimed that their employees do not give them all the true facts. They also stated the withheld information and facts are needed for their career success.
From sharing major updates, having a candid discussion that directly affects employees, giving honest feedback, all to way to according praise, communication in the organizations is
Communication is one of the biggest challenges that we see at companies today. Whether it’s leadership sharing major updates, managers having candid discussions on promotions, or colleagues sharing peer feedback, communicating effectively is often difficult to get right.
Poor communication is prone to organizations with diverse networks of talents. Diverse workplace hierarchies and cultures can also be a factor that restricts communication. However, management systems that have prioritized top-down communication and openness succeed in boosting employee engagement. Organizational transparency is important because it helps to increase trust. While quality service and products guarantee satisfaction for clients and customers, communication guarantees satisfaction for employees.
- Consistent communication from both colleagues and leadership
- Meetings with valued opinions
- Recognition for successes and achieved milestones
- Regular constructive feedback
There is room for growth if organizations can improve communication through some of these outlined steps. These outlines will also make it possible to adopt transparency as one of the secret habits that ensure organizational success.
Increase employees’ sense of ownership
Organizational culture can make or break business success. When you think about organizational culture; free or subsidized meals, coffee, corporate fitness goals, and parties come to mind. Yes, they can help to increase employee engagement. But this engagement is seldom geared towards improving products and services. Transparency in the workplace has a rippling effect on both employee engagement and business growth.
Employees work better in the right direction when they feel a sense of ownership. This sense of ownership is achieved by sharing numbers and factual truths.
Celebrate milestones
Businesses need to change their definitions of milestones to accommodate every level. Most businesses only celebrate big wins of top tier employees, deals, and partnerships. But milestones as little as promotion, completion of tasks should be acknowledged.
Do remember to celebrate milestones once they have been reached. Acknowledging people’s hard work will boost their morale and encourage every other team member.
Inculcating appreciation of milestones into organizational culture o will ensure healthy workplace competition.
Have candid conversations
Organizations can build trust by having the hardest conversations. These conversations create safety and strengthen workplace culture. Employees will feel the need to point out problems if they know they can be heard. It also becomes easy to have open conversations and suggest improvement across sectors. Like every other change, open, candid conversations are only possible with the right approach.
Organizations can start by creating objectives, goals and milestones for every department. They should also discuss the importance and benefits of achieving them. This includes talks about promotion, raises, and what is at stake if such goals are not met. Clarity of each goals is vital to ensure proper accountability and reward.
Clarity also involves discussing new tools and strategies needed to complete milestones efficiently. Companies may feel reluctant to discuss these details because of fear of a project. But when employees feel involved, they do not leave out the project even if it fails. This strategy opens avenues to help employees understand the lessons behind the success or failures of a project. In the long run, transparency increases opportunity for faster development.
Commit to regular reporting
At every point of a project, nuanced changes can arise from differences in results. Review processes helps to increase
transparency which benefits an organization’s progress with projects.
Regular reporting should better be digitalized to save time and enhance project visualization. Every stakeholder should adopt the culture of assessing the progress of goals. Most importantly, this should be done at every level of the organization.
Assessing goals helps to refine what processes are important and what parties should be involved at every stage. This will build focus among team members since they are clear on what to do, whether their tasks are efficient. It also opens their minds to figure out better alternatives that make progress seamless.
Yes, people can challenge current organization priorities and project relevance. Which is by far a trait every modern workplace should have – where being unclear about a project is not frowned at.
Organizational transparency should involve every department.
Every department should be held accountable for achieving transparency. This reduces the strain on the owner.
- HR should have the right tools in place for proper communication. They should also invest time to establish workplace culture and norms. HR can also promote open door policies that ensure effective communication.
- Executives should make it a habit to have several touch-points with department heads and members. They should hold regular meetings and be in charge of creating milestones as well as according celebrations.
- Employees should embrace proper communication and ensure that documents are accessible for proper reporting.
Want help improving your business, make sure to reach out to Bertus Cilliers and set up your free consultation.