Communication, or Lack Thereof...

I'm convinced that communication is critical to success, and yet, the behaviors and practices I see do more to limit and inhibit communication than enhance it. 

Particularly in global manufacturing operations, good communication is essential for success in ensuring the right parts in the right quantity make it to the right customer at the right time.  Many people with different roles and responsibilities using different systems must all understand and execute the same basic instructions. 

Today we can communicate through more mediums than ever.  We can move more information than ever before.  We've become masters of summarization in sending 140-character broadcasts regularly to thousands of people.  Yet I see major misunderstandings or breakdowns in communication, and I believe leaders bear the responsibility to "go back to the basics" and set some ground rules for our people.  Leaders put systems in place all the time, and policy deployment around communication is no different. 

We know communication follows a model:

This model shows that the message can be disrupted at various points (encoding, transmission, decoding).  What this tells leaders is that we first need to assign responsibility/ownership of the message.  Simply assigning ownership of the message is one of the most powerful ways to improve communication.  Those of you in the military know that in your world, the sender owns the message.  If the message isn't received and acknowledged, you are obligated to continue communicating.  Similarly, the receiver is responsible to acknowledge receipt and understanding. 

The modification I make to this image is to add what I call "blockers" (brick walls).  These are specific obstacles that disrupt the encoding and decoding of the message.  This is different than noise, which is inherent in the medium. 

An example of a blocker from my own experience is when I'm communicating with others who speak a different native language.  My Mexican colleagues know that my favorite follow up question is "Tú crees o tú sabes?"  I ask this question ("Do you believe or do you know?") because I've learned that in order to clarify my own understanding of the answers I'm given, I need to specifically ask whether the sender of the message categorically knows the answer s/he is giving me, or if the answer is based on a belief that something was completed/sent/received/accomplished.  This use of the Spanish language helps me increase the quality of communication between my team members in the North American region.

What are the blockers in your business?  How have you deployed your leadership to eliminate them?  These are the critical questions leaders need to consider to improve communication in organizations.  Share your blockers and ask your network to help you eliminate them.