Today, employees find themselves drowning in Emails and Meetings, which hurts their Productivity!

??The rise of remote and hybrid working has made workplace communication increasingly difficult to manage.

?? The majority of employees felt only 3 of the last 5 meetings they attended had value. Also many employees find themselves bombarded with emails, meetings, chat messages, and phone calls, with 50% of employees reporting the flurry of daily communication has the unintended consequence of hindering productivity.

?? Asynchronous formats like video messages are emerging as welcome replacements for some types of meetings and majority of employees believe that video and images improve communication effectiveness in the workplace, according to a new interesting research entitled "From Chaos to Clarity: How to Thrive in the Modern Workplace” published by TechSmith in partnership with Qualtrics using data from over 969 full-time workers in digital communication and collaboration roles from the US, UK, Germany, and France across various industries collected between July to August 2023.

?Communication overload is hurting productivity - Reduce unnecessary back-and-forth

Researchers found that 74% of employees must repeat themselves or clarify information at least some of the time with nearly a quarter saying this happens “often”.

The sheer volume generates even more communication due to misunderstandings and the need for respondents to repeat themselves spawning time-eating back-and-forth message volleys.

?? These communication breakdowns can even result in project delays and missed deadlines.

?Mostly employees working in banking, finance, or insurance are negatively impacted

Researchers noticed that 59% of respondents working in banking, finance, or insurance say they’re feeling the negative impacts on productivity due to the volume of communication.

?Email still reigns as the primary workplace communication tool.

Researchers noticed that despite predictions over the past decades, email still reigns as the primary workplace communication tool.

Some key challenges with emails are:

?Text-heavy messages with important information buried in the content

?Poorly written messages

?Unclear subject lines

?Too many people copied in

?? These common and other challenges with email contribute to the issues affecting productivity: email begets more email.

Researchers found that employees say images like screenshots, infographics, and charts impact the effectiveness of their message so they believed that one way to keep emails clear and concise is to incorporate images so they provided below recommendations:

??Easy ways to use images in your emails:

??Use screenshots to show exactly what you’re referring to when describing a process.

??Use annotated screenshots to provide feedback on a project. Explaining data? ??Use screenshots to highlight the exact data points you’re referring to.

Too much meetings impact productivity

Researchers have discovered that as the second most frequently cited form of workplace communication, so much time spent in meetings with low value can have serious impacts on getting work done

?? On average, employees find only 3 out of 5 meetings are valuable or productive. The importance of “right people/right place” was an issue throughout comments describing hindrances to effective communication.

?Asynchronous formats like video messages emerge to replace meetings

Researchers found that videos, like still images, can improve workplace communication. 98% of employees who use video at work say it impacts the effectiveness of their message in various ways, among them by reducing misunderstandings, increasing engagement, and saving time.

??Additionally, videos can help solve the “right people/ right place” challenge by providing meeting content to the necessary people across time zones and flexible work arrangements

?? Finally, researchers provide 6 following recommendations for leaders to choose the most appropriate means of communication in their workplace:

1?? Use alternate approaches to replace meetings not focused on decision making or brainstorming.

2?? Respondents reported project overload as a hurdle to effective communication; keep an eye on workload and time demands being made by meetings and other messaging.

3?? Those working remotely or in hybrid situations expressed a preference for visual information.

4?? The later cohorts—those born after 1980—are more likely to work entirely in an office or in a hybrid arrangement, and they have a slight preference for visual communication over other types.

5?? Visual communication reduces misunderstandings and saves time. Provide staff with help and training in creating and leveraging more effective images and videos. Note that this might be of extra value to those in the most recent age cohorts: As they prefer visual information but find they experience more problems with unclear communication, they may prove to be exceptionally receptive learners.

6??Supporting quality communication practices shores up trust: It sends the message that you value a worker’s time and want to ensure it is well spent.

Eliminating low-value, real-time meetings and instead offering on-demand video messages can lessen the impact on productivity and keep work moving.

The challenges of juggling schedules to get everyone together add to communication problems, especially as 73% of respondents work either entirely remotely or in a hybrid environment.

Thank you ?? TechSmith and Qualtrics researchers team for these insightful findings: Jane Bozarth Wendy Hamilton Amy Casciotti Bill Hamilton

Dave Ulrich George Kemish LLM MCMI MIC MIoL

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