How important is workplace communication for success in business development? Internal communication affects employee engagement, productivity, and confidence.
Your internal communications strategy plays a big role in your company. Communication shapes your company culture and relations between employees. Frequent communication enables them to stay connected with the company and have a sense of belonging in the workplace.
The way companies communicate has changed over the years, however. Due to digitalization, teams rely mostly on virtual communication channels to keep in touch with various departments.
From morning meetings to afternoon sessions, communicating online has become central to our daily work routine. Whether it’s on Zoom or Google Meet, online meetings enable us to discuss tasks and activities, progress, and future projects.
In many cases, we tend to underestimate the value that workplace communication can bring to a business. Not only does it increase productivity but also morale among employees. In contrast, a lack of communication decreases motivation and general well-being.
These are 4 reasons why it’s important to have good workplace communication:
- Workplace communication increases confidence
- Internal communication resolves conflicts
- Workplace communication encourages teamwork
- Increase employee engagement with workplace communication
1 – Workplace communication increases confidence
For certain business developers, communication is their strongest skill. But, when it comes to the work environment, it’s essential to cultivate a communicative culture for everyone. A place where everyone’s ideas and perspectives are shared and listened to. In this way, employees build confidence in themselves. Confidence allows them to feel good about the abilities and qualities they bring.
Confident employees are an asset to any workplace. They are more focused on their work and perform better in general. Importantly, they also look for confidence in their managers and mentors. So, your team will always value it when you speak to them like a confident leader. Being clear and concise in your communication style is what will encourage them to perform at their best.
Efficient communication inspires team members to collaborate together, be more productive, and find self-fulfillment.
The BD School
So, communicate openly with your team and create two-way conversations. What this means is that your internal meetings should be about giving and receiving feedback and advice, and sharing opinions and ideas. To solidify this as a practice at your firm, it’s useful to have an internal communications strategy. This will help you maintain the overall health of your company. But also ensure that everyone benefits from it.
In a recent study by Indeed, it was discovered that 98% of employees perform better when they feel confident. Confident workers are more likely to engage in projects that may be outside of their comfort zone. Confidence helps them reduce stress and solve problems more efficiently. 94% of the study respondents say they also feel happier when they are confident at work.
Employee happiness is essential for productivity. Specifically, a study by Oxford University shows that employee happiness increases productivity by 13%. What these studies show is that workplace communication affects confidence, happiness, and productivity.
2 – Internal communication resolves conflicts
From time to time, there can be conflicts within the work environment. In general, they are often a result of poor communication. Workplace conflict reduces employee productivity and harms workplace culture. It can even cost you precious time and money. Good workplace communication can help you solve this problem.
There are many things you can do in this case. First, address the issue straight away. Nobody wants to feel disrespected, especially if they’re being misunderstood. So, there should be enough space for every team member to openly share their concerns.
Tackling the conflict quickly will prevent it from turning into a worse situation. To do that, you need to identify the root of the problem. Once you know what led to the problem, gather information from both sides and see what their viewpoints are. In this way, you’ll be able to solve conflicts and not let them affect work-related processes.
Avoiding conflict won’t help you solve it. Talking about it will enable everyone to air out their opinions and listen to those of others, and find an agreeable solution.
3 – Workplace communication encourages teamwork
Ineffective workplace communication can cause confusion and distress among employees. In turn, this weakens team building and can also cause financial setbacks. For example, larger corporations can lose up to $62.4 million per year due to poor workplace communication. Smaller companies lose up to $420,000 annually.
What this shows is that the quality of workplace communication doesn’t only affect the morale, confidence, and productivity of employees. But also profitability. This is useful to consider especially if you work for a young startup. Business development is mainly about generating long-term growth, but profitability is still vital to that.
On the contrary, effective workplace communication allows for teamwork to flourish. Teams that collaborate benefit from each other’s work style, effectiveness, expertise, and talent. They learn to see the company as a unit where everyone’s contribution is valued.
Similarly, team members get to understand their personal limitations in what they do and help each other out when necessary. By having a workplace where communication is a priority, employees trust each other more. In turn, they can often rely on other team members’ advice to be better business developers.
4- Increase employee engagement with workplace communication
Workplace communication doesn’t affect only team relations or confidence. But also, employee engagement. Employees that are more engaged tend to work well to meet shared business goals. In fact, they’re the best types of workers to have. According to a study by Gallup, high employee engagement leads to an increase in productivity, profitability, and well-being.
On the contrary, low employee engagement leads to 81% absenteeism and 41% in quality defects. So, companies with higher employee engagement tend to grow more sustainably and profitably. And have a better workplace culture where employees produce more quality work.
But, how can you ensure there’s good employee engagement?
First, it’s important to be familiar with the right work communication channels. Digital tools can be very helpful when you’re doing business development activities. For example, your team may comprise workers from several locations around the world. You have to communicate regularly with them so that they are aware of business activities, plans, and projects that are going on.
One of the most useful tools for employees and managers to communicate together is Slack. Slack helps teams keep up with important news, give updates on their work, or simply share ideas and connect. Similarly, tools like Trello help you organize projects into cards of checklists and descriptions. You can use it for projects, content ideation and management, and so on. Zoom is another great tool you can use for virtual meetings.
To sum up
To put it simply, well-connected team members make companies better in every aspect. When there’s honest, open, and transparent communication between team members, there’s a greater sense of belonging. On top of that, employees are more motivated, inspired, and ready to take action.
Efficient workplace communication helps break down barriers between departments and ensures that there’s maximum efficiency and success for the company. So, workplace communication shouldn’t be ignored but used to empower everyone to bring out their best.
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