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January 26, 2005

Is learning to communicate like learning Italian?

If your objective is to help managers communicate, it’s logical to explore training as a strategy. After all, couldn’t everyone benefit from communication skills development?

But managers, like all adults, resist learning because “they have to.” Yes, managers will attend the required class or click through the mandatory online course, but many will just go through the motions to meet an obligation.

To really “teach” adults a new knowledge or skills, the motivation has to come from the individual, not from the organization. Only when managers want to learn communication skills—because they believe doing so will help them solve a problem or meet an objective—will learning be embraced and take hold.

That’s where my quest to learn Italian comes in.

I am going back to Italy in October and I am determined to learn to speak Italian before I get there. As a result, I am a motivated learner. So motivated, in fact, that so far I have: 1) received the Rosetta Stone CD course I wanted for Christmas, and completed lessons 1-11; 2) ordered an audio CD for my car recommended by a friend; and 3) signed up for a conversational Italian course at my local community school.

Why do all three? Even though I think the Rosetta Stone (visit the website for a free demo to see for yourself: www.rosettastone.com) course is fabulous—it’s intuitive and visual and interactive and fun—I realized that I need to practice speaking (hence the audio CD) just as much as I need to be able to comprehend. And I also need a live expert to explain things and guide me in the right direction, which is where the course will prove helpful.

I will go to such lengths to learn Italian because it’s my personal goal—one that I care about, and will invest time and money to achieve.

Here’s the question for us communicators: How do we provide communication help for managers that doesn’t feel like an obligation (something the organization wants them to do), but helps managers meet their needs and sets them up for their own self-defined success?

I have lots of ideas; maybe you’d like to share some of your thoughts as well.

Posted by Alison Davis at 01:20 PM

January 21, 2005

Consider a virtual tour for your intranet

Nearly every day I receive information about an external communication innovation or trend that inspires me about how to improve internal communication. Today’s epiphany comes from the always-helpful Pew Internet & American Life Project, which reports that 45% of online American adults have taken virtual tours—in fact, on a typical day, more than two million people use the Internet to tour without leaving the comfort of their own desktop.

I’m sure you’ve taken these tours to virtually visit places like museums, vacation locales, colleges, houses for sale, parks, public places like the White House, and hotels. There are many different approaches to virtual tours, from very sophisticated HGTV Dream Home to relatively simple U.S. Capitol.

Virtual tours represent terrific potential for employee communication, especially if you’ve got a large, far-flung organization. Wouldn’t it be great to give employees the chance to visit other locations without having to travel? Employees could see firsthand what life is like in other parts of the organization—manufacturing facility, warehouse, call center, retail outlet.

And unlike in external tours, which are usually devoid of people, your virtual tours could picture the folks who work in the place being visited. (You could even include quotes or a video featuring employees commenting about what they do.)

I know that many of you have system constraints (most virtual tours work best in broadband), and budgets are always tight. But don’t let those restrictions limit your thinking—keep exploring ways you can take your intranet from merely informative to intriguing and interesting as well. One simple way to start is to create an “album” of still photos of your major facilities.

For more information on the Pew study, visit http://www.centerformediaresearch.com

Posted by Alison Davis at 11:27 AM

January 13, 2005

Can a CEO be too visible?

Ask employees about their communication needs, and they consistently say they’d like the Chief Executive Officer and other senior leaders to be visible and present, engaged in communicating to employees. But is it possible for a CEO to be too visible?

The answer, perhaps surprisingly is yes, especially if the “visibility” is the packaged, managed kind.

Take a well-known Fortune 100 company that’s been weathering some tough times. The CEO has been doing a lot of communicating lately. There’s his photo in the employee newsletter. Here’s his quote in this morning’s electronic bulletin. There he is on a satellite broadcast, making a speech about the company’s strategy for the future.

But employees aren’t impressed. “He gives us the same ‘corporate speak’ as he does to the media,” they say. “It’s all very polished and spun—doesn’t really mean anything.”

And they add: “Maybe if he talked to us directly—in person—and gave the straight story, it would be more meaningful. As it stands, it’s just a lot of empty words.”

If the CEO knew what people thought, he might be offended. After all, he is certainly making an effort. But his hard work has just the opposite effect as intended; it’s not creating confidence, it’s eroding trust.

Why? Employees know that visibility is only skin-deep. What they need is leadership: for the CEO to tell them the truth, treat them as adults, work with them to resolve issues, and demonstrate—in words and action—that “we’re all in this together.”

Communicators sometimes congratulate themselves for the fact that their CEO communicates as well (as much, as timely, etc.) internally as he does externally. Employees know that “as much” is not good enough—they need more from their CEO than the polished, practiced face he presents to the world.

What do you think?

Posted by Alison Davis at 08:28 AM

January 03, 2005

A matter of manners

I find insights about communication everywhere—even when reading fiction.

My latest epiphany came when I was reading Alexander McCall Smith’s latest novel, The Sunday Philosophy Club. (More on Smith later in this web log.) The novel is set in Edinburgh, Scotland, and features as its main character a woman named Isabel Dalhousie, who edits a philosophy journal.

Isabel is, naturally, a philosopher, who thinks deeply about many issues. Here are her musings about manners inspired by the actions of another character named Toby.

Toby “had bad manners; not on the surface, where he thought, quite wrongly, that it counted, but underneath, in this attitude to others. Good manners depended on paying moral attention to others; it required one to treat them with complete moral seriousness, to understand their feelings and their needs. Some people, the selfish, had no inclination to do this, and it always showed. They were impatient with those whom they thought did not count: the old, the inarticulate, the disadvantaged. The person with good manners, however, would always listen to such people and treat them with respect.” (p. 141)

There are a lot of reasons why communication fails in organizations, but the underlying cause is often a lack of respect or, as Isabel puts it, a dearth of manners. This can take many forms, such as: Sending an important communication only via e-mail, despite the fact that a significant percentage of employees don’t have electronic access. Assuming that everyone (even in a global, diverse organization) speaks and reads English, and not providing translations. (Leaders) responding to employee questions as if the questions are “dumb” or annoying. Expecting managers to be advocates of a new strategy or initiative without giving them the time and support they need to understand it.

I could go on, but you get the idea: If we don’t respect the people we’re communicating with, why should they bother to pay attention?

(For those of you unfamiliar with Alexander McCall Smith, I highly recommend you start with The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, which is set in Botswana and features a very unusual and appealing detective, Precious Ramotswe. This book is the first of a series of five mystery novels that are quite wonderful.)

Posted by Alison Davis at 05:06 PM