There are 2 critical problems that plague just about every company: Keeping everybody on the same page and creating a sense of community within the company. Let's discuss how to overcome this...
Stop focusing on day-to-day
Most companies focus on the day-to-day interactions. Email. Software systems (i.e. CRM's, etc.). Internal meetings. The list goes on and on. The problem here is by just focusing on the day-to-day tasks, there is no sense of community or team as time goes on. We all have been a part or know someone that doesn't feel as if their voice is heard. What happens to these people. They feel disconnected to the company. They don't feel appreciated. Their quality of work suffers. Ultimately they quit. This is all costing you money!
The key to avoiding this disconnect is to change the way you look at your company. Start viewing your company as a COMMUNITY. A community that serves a purpose and can really make a change in this world for the better. This idea sounds great, but it's lacking 4 key elements. Let's dive in further...
4 key elements to turning your company into a community
As I always say, you need 4 things inside of a community to achieve your mission.
- Purpose
- People
- Platform
- Process
Purpose
The first step when it comes to creating a sense of community within your company is to identify your PURPOSE. It's why you exist. Oh and no you just don't exist to make money. That's a result of your efforts and value you create.
People
The second is identifying the PEOPLE that can help you get there. To put this in context, it's the people you hire and surround yourself with (i.e. stakeholders, advisors, etc.).
Platform
The third is PLATFORM. You need to have an environment where people within your company can go to simply and effectively share where things are and where they are going. At Phase 2 Solutions, I require everyone in my company to share a weekly video status update inside of our Company HubSite. Of course we use one our own platforms (http://companyhubsite.com) to make this happen
Here is an example of our Community Outreach Coordinator, Laura Pyne, posting her weekly video status update:
An Enterprise collaboration platform like Company HubSite is perfect because it pulls everyone out of the "day-to-day" tools where messages regularly get buried and mis-communicated and focuses on higher level company activities. When you incorporate tools like video recording and automatic email notifications inside of this environment, you completely remove the barriers of mis-communication and engagement.
At a very minimum, the CEO of the company should be using a platform, such as Company HubSite, to share where things are and where they are going. For example, every week I share a video update to everyone in Phase 2 Solutions. I share accomplishments, acknowledge excellent work by team members, and share where we are headed in the next week, month and year. This starts to create a sense of community very quickly. You'll find yourself looking forward to watching status updates. Oh and by the way, this is a heck of a lot better than trying to read text. It's not like you have to read enough as it is - haha. Just think of your internal community platform as a huge boardroom, but in this boardroom everyone everyone has an equal chance to share.
Process
The last part of turning your company into a community and not a workplace is PROCESS. You need to hold people in your company accountable in using the platform. For example, as I mentioned, I require everyone at Phase 2 Solutions to share a weekly status update. If I find a week goes by and a status update hasn't been shared, I will kindly remind them to take care of it. I'm not saying that you need to punish people for not posting, however you need to get them to develop a habit out of sharing inside of the platform. This might take a good month or two. No software in the world, Company HubSite included, will ever control human habit. It might be able to assist (i.e. remind), but never control. That is unless they start implanting computer chips inside of us
Below is a video to discuss this topic a bit further. Please email me or contact me directly through our community to discuss how we can help you get this implemented correctly for your company. That's what we do!