communication Archives - Page 6 of 7

30
Nov 16
4

3 Things That Make People Feel More Appreciated

Tags : appreciated appreciation communication leadership

You’ve heard it before and so have I, people want to know that their work is appreciated, that they are respected, and that their contributions matter. If everyone knows this, then why do so many feel under-appreciated?

Let’s start by making sure we are on the same page with appreciation. Here are three things that when practiced, make a difference.

Show Respect

One of the biggest things that employees are giving (being paid for) is their time. Respect everyone’s time. Value their time as much as you value your own. Start and end meetings on time. Show up on time, and don’t ask someone to stay late while you exit to hit happy hour, be with your family, or other non-work related activities. They have a life too, and likely they aren’t excited about staying late or being rushed because someone else failed to plan or prepare appropriately.

Another gesture of respect is to, ask don’t tell. Ask for help or assistance, don’t tell someone to do it. Ask for the person or team to take on a backlogged project or one that is not so prestigious but still needs to be completed. Ask don’t tell, it always makes a difference.

This is simple stuff, right?

Ask for Input

When and where possible include others in decisions and setting future direction.

Think about starting conversations with things like:

Do you think we should…
How do you think our clients would react to…
What is most important for improving…

This should not be an exercise, but a true and genuine approach for inclusion. If you are only doing it as an exercise it won’t take long to matter as little to them, as it does to you.

No rocket science here, right?

Give Thanks

Unfortunately it is still not uncommon for supervisors, managers, or other positions of authority to demonstrate an attitude with employees that the employee should be thankful they have a job. Yes, it might often be true, but it should never be illustrated as a cultural value. You might be surprised the number of front line employees that I speak with who would jump through hoops for someone just because they know the person values and appreciates their work. Yes, you are paying them (in nearly all cases) but that is compensation, not appreciation.

You might be surprised how engaged and motivated even the most marginal employee will become when they know they are valued and their work is appreciated.

This is really straight forward, the a-b-c’s, am I right?

Why then, do so many employees feel under-appreciated?

The answer is simple. Nearly everyone knows or easily understands the approaches for making others feel more valued and appreciated. That isn’t the problem. It’s not a lack of knowledge.

It is a lack of practice.

– DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and corporate trainer that specializes in helping businesses and individuals accelerate their leadership, their team, and their success. He is a four-time author and some of his work includes, Forgotten Respect, Navigating A Multigenerational Workforce and Pivot and Accelerate, The Next Move Is Yours! Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

Dennis Gilbert on Google+

21
Nov 16
2

How Do You Measure Meeting Effectiveness?

Tags : communication effectiveness meetings zoom

How many meetings do you have? Are there too many? Do feel meetings help or hinder productivity?

Have you ever felt that workplace meetings are a waste of time? Many people I speak with at organizations believe that they are involved in too many meetings or meetings that last far too long. Meetings certainly have their purpose and of course, are connected to the concept of ensuring effective communication, but how do we measure meeting effectiveness?

Why Meetings?

First, let’s consider why we hold meetings. There are many different flavors from brainstorming and strategy, to information exchange, to organizing and planning for an upcoming event, and many others. When you ask around it seems that people don’t mind the strategy sessions as much as they do the repetitive information exchange with the same old details, problems, and unresolved issues.

Meeting Management: How Long Should Meetings Last?

In addition, workplace meetings might sometimes be labeled as staff meetings, sales meetings, or department meetings with varying formats, frequencies, and lengths of time. Do these meetings energize people?

Regular Meetings

Often these regularly held and traditional information updates do not energize. In some cases, these meetings are managed to feel like sessions for bragging rights or workload comparison between people or departments that should feel camaraderie but instead feel more like they are vying for the most kudos or in some type of competition with each other.

regular meetings

Certainly, some friendly internal competition can be effective, but it also has to be managed appropriately and always should reinforce that the organization is most effective as a team and that everyone is in it together.

zoom meeting telework

Are you having Zoom meetings or otherwise engaged in telework? Professionalism and etiquette still matter.

Measuring Effectiveness

Do you have too many meetings? In order to properly assess if you are having too many meetings, you should first consider the value and productivity of the meetings you already have. You’ll need to consider if the right people are in attendance and if the meetings are the right length of time. You’ll need specific agendas, goals, and recaps along with accountability to ensure you’re getting the most from them.

There is a really good chance that the meetings you have in place are supposed to improve communication but you must keep in mind that the act of simply having a meeting will not necessarily improve communication. Additionally, your meetings will need to have appropriate accountability, respect, and trust.

Do you have poor communication? Is it too much or too little?

You should also consider participant engagement. Today we might hold meetings that include BYOD (bring your own device) or we might attend a meeting that insists on no devices being active, and in others, you might have something in between.

What is important to keep in mind is that some of your meeting participants will already know or perhaps completely understand the information being shared. The meeting becomes boring to them; they get disconnected, distracted, and often completely disengaged.

Meeting Evaluation

You must always evaluate how to best serve the entire audience and in some cases, you might want to consider alternative formats or meetings with different participants and different lengths of time.

Do you have effective meetings?

To measure the effectiveness of any meeting at a minimum you must assess:

Frequency
Length of time
Number of participants
Appropriateness for each participant
Atmosphere, climate, environment, location
Rules or guidelines
Goals, objectives, desired outcomes
Performance assurance, accountability

Meetings that are not effective, last too long, have the wrong participants, or are held too often or too little will all be problematic for your communication efforts.

When is your next meeting? Will it be effective?

– DEG

Internal customer service matters just as much as what is reflected externally.

Are you delivering on customer service internally?

Buy Now on Amazon

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and corporate trainer. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

This article was originally published on November 21, 2016, last updated on October 13, 2020.

19
Nov 16
-

Why Are There So Many Meetings?

Tags : communication leadership meetings quality

Meetings are traditionally used as a method to share information, brainstorm on issues, or build better relationships. Why do we have so many meetings?

It’s not uncommon that employees sometimes believe that their organization has too many meetings. It’s also trendy today that the more traditional meetings have changed to more technology oriented or to more informal settings. Many organizations though are sticking to the traditional closed door conference room live and in-person meetings. Are these meetings productive?

Productivity

Productivity in meetings really boils down to effective meeting management. It is not uncommon for a client to ask me to sit in on a staff meeting or a managers meeting to get a feel for what is happening at the organization. From those experiences I can tell you that some are managed very well, others are patched together with people coming and going, arriving late, leaving early, and repeating the same old habits of a focus on presenting problems with little or no attention to presenting solutions. If they aren’t productive why are we having them?

So Many Meetings

Often organizations intend for meetings to be a way to share information relevant to the entire team. There is great benefit to doing this and of course it makes sense that this is a fairly common practice.

What about the meeting held after the meeting that contains additional information about the meeting, or the meeting that is held before the meeting that prepares strategically for how the next meeting will run? And that’s not all, there are the meetings that are held more privately with a select group of people to discuss how other people behaved in the meeting or to brainstorm or forecast what some of those people might do at the next meeting. Let’s not forget about the people who are not invited to the meeting after the meeting who are now nervous about the more private closed door meeting, and then they have a meeting to discuss their paranoia about what is happening at the behind the closed doors meeting.

Wow, deep breaths, deep breaths, and breathe.

One of the most common reasons that organizations are overburdened with too many meetings is because of a lack of trust. Sometimes this may be that people don’t trust that the work will get done, sometimes it is that they don’t trust it will be completed properly or with high quality, and in other cases it may be that they fear someone will cast blame that the people just weren’t informed enough (an excuse?) to be successful. Likely there are many other reasons too, things like gossip, lack of respect, and poor accountability practices. Does your organization have too many meetings?

How Many Are Too Many?

This is often hard to measure but some of this circles all the way back to the question of productivity. If meetings are truly productive it probably won’t feel like there are too many meetings. Keep in mind that much of the measurement also has to do with how many people are involved and the total length of time.

Most likely it is the people who do not recognize or see the value in meetings that are claiming that there are too many. If they see no value, then either the meetings are not being managed effectively or there are disconnects between the reason and the value. Poor meeting quality, or disengaged and disgruntled participants often creates more performance breakdowns, more blame with less accountability, and even creates less trust.

Perhaps most important is the quality not the quantity.

– DEG

Dennis Gilbert on Google+

17
Nov 16
-

Poor Communication: Too Much or Too Little?

Tags : communication conflict meetings trust

Communication is such a complex topic. Often I talk with clients about communication, about factors that influence communication, and about trust issues or even about information overload. Is it possible to have too much communication? Is that poor communication?

Too Much Communication

Many people incorrectly make the assumption that communication break downs are the result of someone not providing a different person with information that they need to know. Here are a few common statements that might be misdiagnosed as a signal for more communication:

No one told me!
I guess I missed the memo! {sarcasm}
I wasn’t in that meeting.

While it might be true that there are times when important information is not shared, there are often many reasons which are not directly related to having an awareness of the need to share information. Things like trust, the fear of causing a conflict, and poor listening skills also substantially contribute to a break down in workplace communication.

too little communication

When a team member, the entire team, or the entire organization come to the conclusion that their communication problems are the result of not sharing enough information the problems sometimes don’t get better, they often get worse.

Too Much or Too Little

Too much communication is just as bad as too little. What happens when people decide to email everyone in the company, use to much courtesy copy, or get a little sneaky with the blind copy function? What if those people don’t necessarily need to be in that loop?

You guessed it, people grow tired of seeing email from a sender which doesn’t apply to them and so they just stop reading, and they don’t just stop reading that email, they stop reading all of them! After some time an email received from Jack or from Jane simply does not matter. The technology savvy employee might even set up a rule in their email management software to file them in a folder that they seldom view.

Communication and Meetings

Email is not the only pathway to providing too much communication. Similar to the email problem management teams sometime decide that they need more meetings or to involve more people in the meetings.

poor communication meeting effectiveness

This might work out okay if that is really a problem but if more people attend the meetings and the information being shared gets more restrictive because of low-trust issues then you have additional problems. Now you have more people removed from otherwise productive work and the meeting content is narrower and important information is not being shared.

So more time is being wasted and the communication has weakened. Should we go a step further?

Productivity Impact

Okay, so if the team has decided to invite more people and yet the additional people are not productive (because they are stuck in the meeting) and less information is shared with the people who definitely need to know then what happens?

You guessed it, another meeting happens because now people need to meet separately with the people who really need to know and of course they can’t disrupt the concept of more people in the original meeting because that is counter intuitive to the decision that they made to share more information.

Poor Communication

When it comes to poor communication, can it get any worse? You bet and often it does.

Yes, there can be too much communication and yes the wrong choices to improve communication in organizations can make things worse, much worse.

– DEG

Originally posted November 17, 2016, Last updated March 17, 2018

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and corporate trainer that specializes in helping businesses and individuals accelerate their leadership, their team, and their success. He is a five-time author and some of his work includes, #CustServ The Customer Service Culture, and Forgotten Respect, Navigating A Multigenerational Workforce. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

Dennis Gilbert on Google+

25
Oct 16
2

Are You Suffering From Information Overload?

Tags : communication email information overload research

Many people insist we are now a society which operates on information overload, too much information and too little time.

Some might argue that writers, bloggers, and social media fanatics add to the problem of overload. Many of the top social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn rely heavily on carefully constructed sharing methodologies as well as specific algorithms for feeding information to friends, followers, or connections. Much of this might be an attempt to minimize redundancy and maximize interest, and some of it is to please shareholders through advertising, post boosts, and other pay-for-display promotions.

Do you feel overloaded?

Information Overload

Today knowing the answer to nearly any question is perhaps just a cell phone away. While there are many aspects related to how each individual person might manage their own information a few of the most common points of consideration include what we read, what we watch or listen to, and how we store what we want to remember. Some might suggest that there isn’t as much need for memory. Today you only need to know how to search for it and retrieve it quickly. Perhaps the development team for the IBM Watson would agree.

The Right Information

Many of us want to be sure we find the right information. We jump on “the internet” and choose a search engine (Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.) and away we go. Suddenly we have millions of possible results based on our simple search words. How do we know what information to use or believe? Since I’m assuming you are not researching for an academic paper, or a master or doctoral thesis, you might be able to utilize just a few simple tips to help you narrow your search.

State your problem. You must know and understand exactly what problem you are seeking additional information about.
State your goal. Finding a picture and some information about a strange bug you saw on the sidewalk is different from building research data for a marketing strategy. Have a clear goal.
Watch for push. So many people are pushing information at you, often trying to entice you for more. Balance all of the push information with pull information. Pull information is what you find and pull towards you. Push is someone else shoving it your way.
Get specific. This one is simple, the more you refine your search parameters the less information you’ll retrieve. Filter what you want to see, read, watch, listen to, and otherwise take in.
Verify sources. Academically this is absolutely critical, but again if you aren’t writing an academic paper or a book based on research you can relax your standards somewhat, regardless look for knowledgeable and trusted resources.
Limit choices. Today, without a doubt you find more than what you can digest. Balance is the key to obtaining more information but not becoming overwhelmed by too much.

We can add many other things to this list such as not believing everything that you read or conspiracy theories that insist others are attempting to alter your state of mind. The list is certainly long, some of it might be true, some of it might be made up, but the key is not to get overwhelmed.

One last thing to consider for improving the use of your time and for minimizing information overload, if you are sharing information with others use links and share buttons, instead of recreating or cutting and pasting information, and in your office consider the effect of courtesy copy or blind courtesy copy on email communication. It seems that nearly everyone wants information, but not to be overloaded.

– DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and coach that specializes in helping businesses and individuals accelerate their leadership, their team, and their success. He is the author of the newly released book, Forgotten Respect, Navigating A Multigenerational Workforce. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

Dennis Gilbert on Google+

21
Oct 16
4

Is There Anything Worse Than No Feedback?

Tags : communication feedback generational differences job performance

You’ve been waiting far too long, why haven’t you heard anything? In the scope of your workplace life some might believe that the subject of feedback is relatively unimportant, but others strongly disagree.

Have you ever been given a new job task or duty and waited for some feedback from your supervisor? Have you applied for a job and anxiously waited for some news only to hear nothing? Have you made a phone call or sent an email that was significant to you and waited for a response that never came?

Underestimated

It seems that much of our society today has grown accustom to the idea that if you don’t want to deal with something, you just let it go. You never say anything, you never respond, you just do nothing. Some believe that this is the socially accepted norm, and others want to jump out of their skin with frustration.

A lack of returned calls, return email messages, and very limited job performance feedback represent costs that are significantly underestimated in today’s workplace. Much of this could be categorized and labeled as poor communication, but what is worse than the communication aspect is that there is an enormous amount of anxiety and stress associated with organizational cultures that support this style. Of course, someone might suggest that it is only stressful if you allow it or if your expectations are too high, or with a bit of sarcasm, express that it only matters if you care.

Generational Challenges

Through people that I’ve coached or otherwise informally surveyed it would appear that the more recent workforce generations typically are not as anxious about a return telephone call or an email when compared with those generations that have been in the workforce longer. In fact, for the more recent generations we might have to dig deeper to the medium of text messaging or social media channels to find their preferred communication platform, but even there they likely don’t expect it. On the other hand, they might feel a little anxious about a lack of feedback concerning their job performance.

There is a workplace stereotype often associated with this issue suggests that baby boomer supervisor’s want a culture of no news is good news, but millennial direct reports want immediate gratification. Stereotype or not, if this is real, it signals a communication problem and when ignored or taken for granted this often leads to higher levels of anxiety, more absenteeism, and even employee turnover.

I Don’t Want Feedback

This topic wouldn’t be complete without addressing those who believe job performance feedback is their worst enemy. I’ve heard the arguments in seminars. Some believe that any feedback at all is counterproductive, but especially distasteful and unwanted is feedback that signals any kind of performance improvement. They often offer that they give their best effort to all of their work and if it isn’t good enough, then it just is-what-it-is. They offer the challenge that they would be much more motivated if people said nothing and just allowed them to continue with their work.

I challenge that if there is something wrong, incorrect, or that could be improved wouldn’t you want to know? Would you feel any embarrassment if you were producing poor or rejected work for weeks, months, or years and no one told you? Imagine everyone walking on egg shells while your ego is pleased because you’ve received no feedback. No one said you had to like it, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t necessary. And with that said, yes, there is a difference between constructive feedback and negative or mismanaged feedback. Feedback experts will insist that it is not constructive criticism, it is constructive feedback.

I would like to suggest that there should be more returned calls, more email responses, and more constructive feedback.

Is there anything worse than no feedback? Sure, it is feedback that is mismanaged, but that is a different topic.

– DEG

Dennis Gilbert on Google+

18
Oct 16
6

Are You Listening With Empathy?

Tags : communication empathy leadership listening multi-tasking

Listening is an interesting skill, and it is important to note that listening is not the same as hearing, listening is a developed skill. People who are listening with empathy are listening for understanding.

Have you ever been in a one-on-one or small group conversation and someone surprisingly asks a question or makes a specific statement about something that was clearly stated only a few moments ago? Not a follow up question or statement, but one that seems to be exactly the same information that was just presented by someone else. Perhaps, in order to not lose their current thought they keep processing it over and over and while doing so they are not listening. Then when there is a pause in the conversation they blurt out what is on their mind. If you’ve ever experienced this you know how strange it feels, if you haven’t hopefully you are not the one who is committing this social blunder.

Many people proudly state that they have the ability to multitask. While it is true that we may be able to walk and chew gum at the same time many experts agree that our thinking and perception processes are truly via a single channel. We might be able to spend a nanosecond here, and a nanosecond there, and give the appearance or illusion of multitasking but true cognitive multitasking doesn’t occur. So when you are thinking, processing, or trying to remember your rebuttal while someone else is speaking chances are pretty good you are not listening.

Given that we do not have a disability or physical problem with our hearing, we hear noises, sounds, and even voices, but listening is about processing the information, developing an understanding of what is being said, processing some more, and then perhaps offering a response. Perhaps many times we’ve heard that people fail to listen to understand, and that they listen only to respond.

Listening with Empathy

Listening with empathy is important for many reasons. If you are in a leadership position of any kind it might be important that you develop this skill so that you are not listening to agree or disagree, but to develop a deeper understanding. If you are in customer service, sales, or many other workplace roles it might be critical that you are not quick to form judgment, be biased, or stereotype people during a conversation. Listening with empathy is not sympathy, other than sounding similar they have little to nothing in common. If you are listening with empathy you are listening for understanding.

Are you a fast moving multitasking extraordinaire who can finish someone else’s sentence? Don’t count on it. Do you observe others in your workplace or those who you frequently converse with and after some period of time you are convinced you know what they are about to say in any given conversation? Don’t count on it. Great listeners are not judging, they are not assuming, and they are not listening to respond. They are listening to understand.

Listen with empathy.

– DEG

Dennis Gilbert on Google+

04
Oct 16
-

Is Internal Customer Service More Important?

Tags : communication customer service experience respect workplace culture

I believe that we learn the basics of customer service at a very young age. Before we are teenagers we probably know something about friendliness, kindness, and the power of a smile. We may not realize the linkages of our life experiences to business performance, but the fundamentals of customer service are often present. What about internal customer service?

workforce customer service

All grown up and active in the workforce we are often reminded of the need for enhancing these fundamental skills and in our job roles is where it really starts to count. We can recite cliché phrases such as “The customer is always right” or “Customer service is our core value,” and we quickly learn that anticipating customers’ needs before they ask is when we are performing really, really well.

No Rocket Science

In seminars I suggest that there isn’t any rocket science associated with customer service, but there is always plenty to learn. It’s more than just flashing a smile, being polite, and trying your hardest to meet or exceed expectations. I’m not surprised when participants quickly embrace all the fundamentals allowing us to dive deeper into skills related to examining needs and creating those lasting, unforgotten impressions. What does sometimes surprise me is that many people in the workforce don’t understand the need for internal customer service.

internal or external service

What do you think is more important: internal or external customer service?

Internal Customer Service

Internal customer service in its simplest terms is the practice of creating an exceptional customer-service experience–only instead of focusing on the external customer, we are doing it internally with peers, teams, supervisors, direct reports, and essentially everyone. Someone we’ve worked around for several months or several years doesn’t become someone who we should fail to serve, or disrespect, or in some way devalue or ignore. In fact, he or she may just represent the opposite. It seems easy to get onboard (wrongfully so) with the attitude that someone in another department, work group, or different corporate location really doesn’t matter all that much to our personal success; after all, we pride ourselves on putting our (external) customers first.

Communication customer service

Communication or miscommunication is often blamed as the root cause for sabotaging the external customer experience, and, of course, there is plenty of evidence lending support to that conclusion. However, one question worthy of finding an answer to is how the actions or behaviors associated with internal customer service influence the external experience.

Most Critical

Internal customer service is critical for

creating a “do as we do,” not a “do was we say” culture;
discovering problems first before they go external;
ensuring that respect and appreciation are core values;
building foundations for energizing positive experiences; and
uniting the team and creating a focus on the customer experience.

Perhaps the first step for any organization is to identify what internal customers means to its success. While there is likely a general workflow and specific positions or workgroups that are designated for internal support, sadly many employees fail to realize what internal customer service really means. Once the entire team understands and is committed to an exceptional internal service experience, the external experience will have the foundational support necessary to drive exceptional results.

World of importance

In a world of narrow profit margins, competing technologies, and a service economy, your most important product may be your ability to create a positive, lasting, never-to-be-forgotten customer experience.

Is internal customer service more important? I think it definitely comes first.

– DEG

custserv book culture

Buy Now on Amazon

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and corporate trainer that specializes in helping businesses and individuals accelerate their leadership, their team, and their success. He is a five-time author and some of his work includes, #CustServ The Customer Service Culture, and Forgotten Respect,Navigating A Multigenerational Workforce. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

Dennis Gilbert on Google+

29
Sep 16
8

Do Questions Create Focus?

Tags : communication focus leadership results strategy

Years ago I was preparing to facilitate a strategy session with about a dozen business stakeholders and as part of my preparation I researched several business articles and books. One of the most important ideas that occurred to me during this process was that it wasn’t my content, my relevant business experience, or a fancy chart that was going to drive the direction of the session. It wasn’t going to be the statistics, data mining, or popular wisdom, although certainly all of those can be important. What was really going to drive this group to form a new direction were questions, not statements.

The best leaders are experts at asking questions. Sure they can tell people a suggested course of action based on their own experiences, or they can express that doing X will create the desired result Y. Often statements of direction will spring people into action and when some success occurs, the logic is to repeat the previous behavior.

Unfortunately, when the results begin to slow down or even worse, they stop; we often go back to the behaviors that worked before, only this time we do it with more frequency or quantity. The logic is if this worked before, we just need to do more of it. This again is sometimes effective, but eventually we get caught in a circle of action and reaction, people get overwhelmed, overloaded, or grow tired of the same process with diminishing results.

Questions Create Focus

When we want people and teams to really get behind an effort, a strategy, or a new direction, to be bought-in for the future, committed and focused, questions are often the most effective communication method.

Consider these examples of statements for focus:

Many businesses are pushing their marketing to more and more digital platforms; we should do more of this.
Our biggest competitor just launched a new product that outperforms ours; we need more features on our existing model.

Consider these questions for focus:

What is trending in marketing today? How or what do we need to do capture the momentum of any trends?
What is the market life-cycle of our product line? What would make our product better?

Telling a person or team to move in a specific direction will get some results, some of the time. Let’s face it, there are many people in the workforce that only react when they are told and there are many workplace cultures that demand an authoritarian approach. However, the most successful cultures, those with motivated, committed, and passionate teams, are typically not lead through this type of approach. Sure we need a variety of knowledge, skills, and abilities in any workplace and many times we need a mix of front line people and management team members. We need soldiers as well as generals. We need people who work towards a specific hourly, daily, or weekly goal, and we need those who are more supervisory or management personnel, and a lot of mixture of both.

When it comes to creating focus, sometimes it is the questions, not statements that cause people to pause and think for themselves. Questions explore solutions without exemplifying problems. Questions create those (ah-ha) moments when it really sinks in and people see the correlation between process and product, action and result.

Use more questions.

– DEG

Dennis Gilbert on Google+

27
Sep 16
8

5 Tips to Create Buy-in for Change.

Tags : buy-in change communication leadership

Good leadership is sometimes defined by the ability to effectively manage change. Creating buy-in for change initiatives often centers on skillful navigation and communication strategies.

Show me a team processing change and I’ll show you people concerned or struggling to create buy-in. Buy-in doesn’t have to be some elusive nebulous buzzword that everyone knows they need but no one knows how to create it.

Skillfully navigating or leading workplace change can be much easier when you keep these five tips in mind:

Acknowledge and highlight successful changes in the past no matter how small. Collective wins build confidence and confidence is often one of the missing factors when it comes to getting teams over the hump. If you don’t have any past collective wins share stories that highlight others determination, persistence, and abilities to overcome obstacles.
Openly share what you know about the change and what you don’t know. Today we hear so much in the news about transparency, likely because it is relevant for establishing and building trust. When it comes to change, most people don’t like surprises. When everyone knows what to expect and when they’ll feel more comfortable and trusting while transitioning.
Include short term goals as required to keep the feeling of progress and accomplishments high. We’ve often heard that small steps lead to big wins and this is definitely true when it comes to change efforts. Even focusing on the smallest win will help keep people from straying into a focus on work that might have required do-overs, direction changes, or re-work.
Be as fluid as possible, allow room for approaches or solutions that may be different, but will still achieve the end result. Too often rigidity stops progress and front-line people are well versed in assessing speed and alternative approaches to getting the desired results. It might not appear on the project roadmap, but fine tune any project approach by accepting detours that don’t derail progress and still achieve the desired end result. Be fluid.
Repetitively acknowledge all efforts that are consistent with the new vision and objectives. Be a strong role model by modeling the behaviors that align with where you are going while also highlighting and acknowledging others who have already transitioned or who are making positive progress. What you focus on is what you get and that is definitely true during change efforts.

Nobody said change was easy, and nobody said that everyone will like it, but just because it is hard or unpopular doesn’t mean that it isn’t a good idea or necessary. You’ll almost always meet resistance to change and have to carefully transition through any change effort by being an exceptional communicator. Effective communication helps build the trust and integrity that are required to navigate even the most delicate situations; it also is the foundation for great leadership.

– DEG

Dennis Gilbert on Google+

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Tag Archives: communication

Nov 16

Nov 16

Why Meetings?

Regular Meetings

Measuring Effectiveness

Meeting Evaluation

Nov 16

-

Nov 16

-

Too Much Communication

Too Much or Too Little

Communication and Meetings

Productivity Impact

Poor Communication

Oct 16

Information Overload

The Right Information

Oct 16

Underestimated

Generational Challenges

I Don’t Want Feedback

Oct 16

Listening with Empathy

Oct 16

-

No Rocket Science

Internal Customer Service

Most Critical

Sep 16

Sep 16

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