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Once upon a time, Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson went camping. During the night, Holmes woke up, and he could see the stars shining brightly. He called over to his companion: “Watson, what does seeing the stars in the middle of the night mean to you?” Watson awoke, looked up and gazed at the sky for a moment, then said, “Infinity is sometimes incomprehensible and sometimes comprehensible. We are but a speck in the universe, yet we are blessed with a thing called consciousness. . . .” “Watson, you idiot,” interruptedHolmes, “it means that someone stole our tent.”

People in organizations are perpetually trying to figure out what their leaders really mean when they make pronouncements, state goals and priorities, or even when they merely make an observation or deliver some offhand news. One reason, to be sure, is that leadership isn’t always adept at delivering messages in ways that are clear,complete, and consistent.

In our experience, all too many organizations discover, especially through internal surveys, that employees are often confused about what’s important, what customers really want, and what they should be attending to. Research confirms this. In a Conference Board study, barely more than half the respondents rated their executive teams very effective at communicating direction; just 21 percent felt that senior management was very effective, and only 5percent regarded middle managers as very effective.3

Taken from : The Leader As Communicator

Several years ago we worked with a new spin-off company, one that was separating from a well-known blue chip corporation. Suffice it to say that employees tapped to go with the new organization were not ecstatic. Their most pronounced feeling was one of being a castoff from the mother ship. Enter the CEO-designate of the new organization, an upbeat, shirtsleeve, down-to-earth guy. He regularly sent out general e-mails to the workforce. He was also known for personally answering e-mails from individual employees. Despite the inevitable job reductions that came along with the spinoff, he received a rousing ovation from the workforce at the firstheadquarters employee meeting. People felt they could trust him to be on their side.

For leaders at all levels (not just CEOs), see Figure 6-1 for tactics for getting the attention of those you want to be listening.

Figure 6-1. Communication tactics to get attention. ? Personalize your message. Speak in the first person and definitely use “I” rather than the corporate “we” when it’s appropriate. ? Tell people how you feel about the issue or decision you’re discussing. Let them know where you stand or what doubts or questions you might have. ? Put your stakes in the ground, then flag them. If you’ve allocated resources to a project, let people know about the nature of your commitment. ? Convey any legitimate sense of urgency that might pertain (but try not to make every communique´ sound like a call to arms). ? Communicate when there’s a reason, rather than just sending regular updates. Too many content-thin communications will become self-defeating: Employees will zap your e-mails and put your memos into the circular file without reading them. Communicating only when you need to keeps people on the alert for what you have to say. ? Limit the length of your communications (the “one-page memo” is a good standard to use, for example). ? Use multiple ways to deliver the same message content. Saying it more than once in different ways raises the odds of getting through (it’s the way ad campaigns work best).

Taken from : The Leader As Communicator

“The messages that both evoked emotion and were personalized were more than twice as likely to be attended to as the messages without those attributes.”1

In a study we conducted of the relative effectiveness of various internal communication vehicles conducted for a large printing company, employees said they most regularly attended to e-mail messages sent by the CEO. Those e-mails were intermittent, but reasonably frequent, and sent to everyone in the company. Typically prompted by some important company decisions or significant industry developments, they were always short and to the point and “sounded like” the CEO. Employees said they felt like they were being spoken to directly by their leader and appreciated this asmuch for the gesture as for the information the e-mails conveyed.

Interestingly, the Davenport and Beck study reported that “almost half the messages that got high levels of attention were e-mails, while only 16 percent were voice mail messages. Messages in other media grabbed even less attention.”2 E-mails clearly lend themselves to being personalized, and when they embody the other attributes noted above, they can be an effective and inexpensive way to get the attention of large audiences. Leaders should be careful not to overuse them. For example, respondents in the printing industry study discussed above said that if the e-mails had been sent out ona scheduled basis, they would not have been nearly so appreciated as when they were perceived to be impromptu.

Taken from : The Leader As Communicator

“Yesterday we stood on the precipice of a great abyss, and today we’ve taken a giant step forward.”

Setting direction is a fundamental task of leadership, and communicating direction can be accomplished with varying degrees of effectiveness. We see the task as having three critical components. The strategies we discuss here and the illustrations we provide are all about dealing effectively with one or more of these three components:
1. Getting (and keeping) people’s attention
2. Building awareness and understanding
3. Persuading people to act

Component I Getting ( And Keeping ). Poeple’s Attention
She: “You don’t listen to half of what I say.”
He: “Yes I do.”
Let’s face it. It’s not easy to get people’s attention amid all the other messages flowing out to employees in an endless stream. Leaders often have to elbow their way through this communication traffic to be heard. How then do leaders get people’s attention?

In a survey of business executives, Thomas H. Davenport and John C. Beck tried to determine the attributes of those messages that attracted the highest levels of attention. Overall, the attributes, in rank order, were:
? “The message was personalized.
? “It evoked an emotional response.
? “It came from a trustworthy or respected sender.
? “It was concise.

Taken from : The Leader As Communicator

“For as knowledges are now delivered, there is a kind of contract of error between the deliverer and the receiver; for he that delivereth knowledge desireth to deliver it in such form as may be best believed, and not as may be best examined; and he that receiveth knowledge desireth rather present satisfaction than expectant inquiry.” Sir Francis Bacon, In Stephen Jay Gould. Best American Essay 1994

The most basic function of leadership communication is to tell people what needs to be done and help them do it. In this sense, leaders serve as navigators for their organizations, assisting others in charting the right course, steering toward. it, and staying on it, no matter what the weather. This function has never been quite so easy and straightforward in its execution as leaders would like it to be, and that situation probably hasn’t changed much in the four hundred years since Francis Bacon offered his observationsin The Advancement of Learning.

In Part 3 we look at how leaders handle three navigator communication roles: direction setter—clearly identifying “true north” (chapter 6), transition pilot—keeping a steady course in times of transition and change (chapter 7), and linking agent—crossing organizational boundaries to keep all stakeholders moving and workingtogether (chapter 8).

These chapters address issues of effective delivery and dissemination of key information. They cover some of the special challenges inherent in persuading people in organizations to make changes and in dealing with wholesale organizational change. They also examine the attributes of leadership communication that successfully connect different groups and different stakeholders in increasinglyglobal enterprises.

Throughout, we take pains to be cognizant of the difficulty, even in the best of times and conditions, for communication to be truly successful: for leadership messages to be received, interpreted in the ways the speakers intended, and responded to appropriately.

Taken from : The Leader As Communicator

More and more organizations appear to be formally assessing the impact and effectiveness of their internal communications. Leadership communication is a big part of that and as such needs to be a part of the research. Employee attitude surveys and performance evaluations are two of the most common places to check on how well you keep people informed, how you show respect, how you solicit input and feedback from your people, and so on. We share some assessment tools for strengthening leadership communicationin chapter 13.

If as leaders you understand that your communication is a critical element in creating a healthy, desirable work environment, in which trust and openness are “values in use,” you will welcome assessment of how well you’re doing. You will want to periodically review the “leadership dialogue” across the organization and ask how well it’s working. Generally, this can be done through the survey strategies mentioned above. But it’s also worth noting that if leadership senses any significant indications of mistrust in leadership,then other measures can be taken.

Focus groups led by a skilled facilitator are one of the best ways to learn more about such problems and how to fix them. These discussions can get inside issues of weak leadership communication and also suggest remedies. Because mistrust in leadership is generally harmful to morale and a source of much misunderstanding, any redflags here are well worth prompt attention.

In his elegant little book The Magic of Dialogue, Daniel Yankelovich lists three core requirements for effective dialogue in organizations: “empathic listening, equality of standing, and nonjudgmental surfacing of assumptions.”18 We think this list highlights much of what we’ve tried to say about the trust-building role of organizational leaders. It also suggests a starting point for organizing assessment initiatives. Being an effective, empathic listener; communicating as a colleague and “partner” as often as possible; and bringing ideas, beliefs, assumptions, and information, yours as well as theirs, out into the open, are all important leadership attributes and are all worth keeping track of so leaders can continuously work on developing them as personal and organizational assets.

Taken from : The Leader As Communicator

You’ve heard the one about the horse who said to his rider, after the rider kept patting his neck and saying what a good horse he was, “No, stupid. I said ‘feedbag,’ not ‘feedback’ ”? Well, nobody can be expected to hear it right every time. But listening is still the too often ignored other side of the leadership communications coin. Being a good listener is a wonderful way to convey respect;strengthen relationships; and, ultimately, to reinforce trust.

Listening Skills

Many organizations address the need to improve listening effectiveness by having leaders (and perhaps others) polish up their “listening skills.” Our take on effective listening is that it’s not so much a matter of skills and their application as it is of forming habits and then sticking with them. Some of the habits are fairly intuitive and obvious: Pay attention to the speaker; tune out distractions. Others are less obvious and less frequently demonstrated.

A few years ago, AlliedSignal Aerospace wanted to move toward more team-centered work processes. Middle managers serving as team leaders would be critical to the success of this shift. As CEO Dan Burnham acknowledged in a message to them, “It’s not enough to know only what you are doing. You have to know what everyone is doing too.”17 AlliedSignal accordingly placed internal communication among its highest priorities and made available to all leadership ranks a series of workshops and support materials on subjects like delivering effective messages, handling difficult situations,and leading a meeting.

The thread that linked all of these tasks was effective listening. A few years after this initiative, one of the authors encountered some AlliedSignal middle managers at a conference, where they acknowledged that one of the most significant consequences of making communication a priority was that people felt more connected to their managers; managers had become more accessible and more approachable. It’s what can happen when leaders develop habits of listening more attentively. Figure 5-6 describes five good listening habits.

Taken from : The Leader As Communicator

One way to do this is “by ensuring that the supervisor has a voice in decision making, and making sure the supervisor has something to say, that she or he has privileged access to information.”16 In sharing privileged information, senior leaders communicate a degree of trust that perhaps had not been previously extended. In asking sincerely for frontline managers’ help at a critical time, seniorleadership is communicating how valuable they are to the enterprise.

Building a stronger sense of partnership, where everyone has a common stake in success, works both ways. From a communication standpoint, leaders want to be able to share information reasonably openly. But they also want to be confident that everyone in the organization assumes the same regard for the value of information and becomes, if you will, a partner in protecting it as well. Organizational stewardship is about being a good custodian of organizational assets. Where communication is concerned, everyone needs to assume this role so that knowledge assets aren’t leaked, squandered,or lost.

Internal communication within any organization becomes more critical as we gravitate to more knowledge-based enterprise. While increased access to information is becoming a hallmark of greater efficiency, it is also an important dimension of enhanced relationship building and higher levels of trust within the organization. In addition to emphasizing information stewardship and opening up new lines of communication with frontline managers, there are some other basic strategies for reducing distance, real or imagined, between organizational leaders and subordinates (see Figure 5-5).

Figure 5-5. Communication tactics for closing the gap.
? Emphasize face-to-face communication as often as possible: It’s the ultimate strategy for humanizing relationships in a bureaucracy.
? Share airtime: Be seen as a listener as well as a direction giver.
? Position yourself as a colleague: Talk “common stake, common fate.”
? Invite criticism and push-back (and then be prepared to use it): If you can take it as well as give it, communication roles can be leveled and better dialogue can occur.
? Empathize: Listen to people’s stories and tell them you can understand how they feel.
? Show employees you care about them as people: Sincerely asked questions about nonwork matters, as well as expressions of interest in their careers, go a long way.
? Don’t be afraid to share a personal side of yourself: It’s about opening up to others and showing them it’s okay for them to do likewise.

Taken from : The Leader As Communicator

Clearly there’s a disconnect here. If leadership wants to increase employee commitment to the company and its goals, but informs them about significant developments only after the fact, the commitment will not come. To avoid falling off the communication tightrope, leaders need to err on the side of disclosure, while not being afraid to identify those aspects of change and the future, where they’re legally constrained or just aren’t sure about. In the final analysis, conceding vulnerability can be read as a strength.

Do you want to say One of the most reliable indicators of trustworthiness in leadership is of course their ability to “walk the talk.” Earlier we equated certain kinds of leadership communication with the making of a compact, a compact that commits leaders to make good on their word. Several companies we’ve worked with regularly survey their employees on how well leaders are delivering on this compact. Figure 5-4 lists tactics leaders can use to good advantage in doing whatthey said they would do.

There’s another disconnect that has grave consequences for leadership reputation. It involves leadership touting values like teamwork and trust, but then sending a different message through their recognition and promotion practices. Organizations communicate to their members in many ways, but “who gets rewarded” is in itself one of the most telling communications, even if we don’t think about job promotions, say, as a communications issue. Employees do, and they’re typically quite attentive to this kind of organizationcommunication.

Jack Welch’s comments on not promoting those who made their numbers “on the backs of people” (cited in chapter 3) address this concern directly.Welch came back to this communication issue in an interview when he was asked by an audience member about GE’s well-known practice of moving out the bottom 10 percent of performers. The questioner considered the practice a little harsh and unfair. Welch replied that the real unfairness occurred when employees were told in performance reviews that their work was satisfactory when it wasn’t. Holding back poor evaluations and failing
to point out specific performance deficiencies was, in Welch’s view, an example of “false kindness.” It represented an essentially dishonest communication to an employee, which ultimately rendered a disservice to employee and organization alike.14

Taken from : The Leader As Communicator

Leadership Attributes That Strengthen Trust and Commitment
? Admitting uncertainty when leaders are not fully informed, or just don’t know
? Selectively exposing weaknesses—areas where they can’t claim expertise
? Expressing interest in analyzing failure, rather than ignoring it13

Leaders who are not afraid to appear vulnerable, and who can balance the need to seem in control with the ability to share doubt and uncertainty when they exist, are leaders who command more respect. Their words are listened to with more, rather than less, credulity. They are seen as more approachable, and more reliable, by people who work with them.

Leaders who maintain this less than totally rigid posture regarding the need to appear in control will say things like:
? “I may not have a full view of the picture yet.”
? “I can’t tell you right now that I have enough information to say anything useful.”
? “I don’t have a complete understanding of the situation.”
? “I can’t answer that question; I just don’t know.”
? “I’m not sure right now, and we’re not going to make a decision until we’re sure.”
? “Don’t count on me to be an expert in this area.”
? “I may have made a bad call here.”
? “We screwed up; let’s acknowledge it, and move on.”

It might seem uncomfortable (even “New Age”) to traditional leaders to make statements like these, but the research and our own experience suggest that leaders have much more to gain than lose in backing off the tendency to always appear in tight control of the game.

Walking a Tightrope
Leaders probably most want to seem on top of the situation during times of major organizational shifts or crises. And it is during these times that assertions about the future and being in control are most likely to blow up in leaders’ faces. To be sure, change situations can turn leadership communication into a tightrope walk. If leaders say too little, or confess ignorance about where the organization is going, their people are likely to lose confidence in them. In one large health-care organization that had gone through several mergers, employees indicated in a survey that they doubted their leadership even had a plan, because communication was either inconsistent or nonexistent. Leadership was generally thought to be asleep at the wheel.

Sometimes, leaders can wait too long to deliver important news. In one such instance, a big communication company embarked upon a major rebranding effort, backed by substantial research on their present market positioning and where it needed to go. The company actually ran a series of full-page ads in the Wall Street Journal to usher in its new identity before someone thought to formally communicate this shift to the workforce. Employees felt that leaders had shown them considerable disrespect in not informing them
until after the general public. And it’s not uncommon for us to find employees in different companies complaining that the way they hear important news about their organization is on Yahoo or some other public source.

Taken from : The Leader As Communicator