As a manager, how do you communicate with your team? Do you have a systematized, reliable process for sharing both large and small segments of information with your employees? Or do you rely on the default communication structure in any organization?
That default communication structure is the rumor mill. In this day of incredible technology, many organizations, departments and teams still rely on the rumor mill to spread information throughout the ranks. The rumor mill runs at lightening speed thanks in part to your employees' use of incredible technology. But it has awful accuracy. And that awful accuracy could be hurting your management efforts.
COUNTERACT THE RUMOR MILL
Managers must counteract the effects of the rumor mill if they're serious about leading their group efficiently and proficiently. The best counteracting can be accomplished by committing to:
1. Communicate often
In many work groups, the level of communication is high, but the frequency is too low. This often results in a communication-starved group, and when they're starved, the group will find information somewhere (even if it's outdated or inaccurate). The best way to fight information starvation is to give employees what they want: communication.
2. Communicate accurately
Don't tell your team that the executive in charge of your division has desired to create a new position of Director of Social Media Marketing if the executive in charge of your division is only considering creating a new position of Director of Social Media Marketing. Communicating often is only helpful if the information being communicated is accurate.
3. Communicate both "need to know" and "nice to know" bits of information
Some employees in a work group don't care about anything, so #3 won't help them (but then, what will?), but many employees like to know nice to know information just as much as they want to know the vital stuff. So go ahead and tell them that your company's employment ads will now be placed on CareerBuilder instead of Monster, or that the garbage is now being picked up by Ted's Sanitation instead of Waste Management. Employees like to be in the loop.
4. Communicate important information to ALL your team
Great damage can be done by cherry picking who receives certain bits of information, either be cherry picking intentionally or out of lack of discipline. Of course, there will always be times when only certain individuals or certain groups need to know some bits of information, but the general information (like "We're going to be moving our offices down the street to the 731 building") shouldn't be shared with a few people, thereby allowing the rumor mill to disseminate the information to the remaining employees.
Besides, as the game Telephone shows us, by the time the last employee in your group has heard the rumor, you'll be moving your offices not down the street to the 198 building, but to the suburbs on 198th street.
5. Communicate with proper timing.
There's a proper time and place for communicating particular bits of information. Make sure your timing is wise. The time to tell your group that Tina in payroll was let go is the same day or day after she was let go, not three weeks after Tina's employment was terminated (just ask your three employees who have been frantically emailing and leaving voicemail messages for Tina - to no avail - for two weeks). On the other hand, it's equally as damaging to tell your group on Tuesday that Tina has been terminated when Tina's manager wasn't going to terminate her employment until Friday. Ouch.