Communications Strategies - Lend Me Your Ears

You can have superb communications strategies supported by great high-tech systems but in some cases, you can still unintentionally manage to generate hilarity. It's also worth keeping in mind that communications strategies are not just about how you connect up different sites through the internet or any other form of network. It's all about how you communicate 'meaning', capture interest and add value - and that's sometimes harder than communicating data! Essentially, it's about culture first and then technology.

The channels

There are now so many different channels you can use to communicate your key messages (or facilitate your business processes) that it's almost impossible to describe them in any single article. The Internet, TV, the media, social networking, wireless networking onto PDAs etc etc. They all have a part to play. Yet however many channels you have open to you, someone, somewhere, still has to deliver the message either in writing or audio/video. That's where the first possible problem arises!

Et tu Brute?

Not all of us are natural and inspirational orators or writers rivalling Shakespeare in our use of the language. It's possible to be a brilliant executive but have very little natural ability at effective and consistent communication even within the frameworks of guiding communications strategies. Sound implausible for people that have progressed so far in an organisation? Well, experience suggests that it's sometimes true.

If you've ever listed to a speech that consists of someone reading out in a monotone, some previously prepared notes, then you'll know how painful that can be. Even auto-prompters and modern aids can't entirely eliminate this problem because it relates to human psychology.

If you're someone that just doesn't feel happy in front of a camera or large audience then instead of standing there like a paralyzed robot, let someone that is more naturally gifted in that environment, deliver your message.

The message what I have got

Hopefully, most professional people are capable of avoiding major grammatical errors in writing but it's not entirely unknown for some to be unable to express themselves clearly and concisely.

If you are issuing a written communication, whether internally or externally, the last thing you need is for it to contain ambiguities and contradictions. It's unlikely to get your message over if people are simply ridiculing it or saying that it's unintelligible. So, once again, let your communications be something that are professionally constructed for you if writing isn't your thing.

Technology

Technology is sometimes best thought of as a way of moving your communications around - in other words a way of facilitating communication rather than 'doing it' as such. Poorly thought-through communications strategies aren't going to become any better simply because they're going over a state-of-the-art network. That just makes it a faster inept communication.

Take the example of one CEO that arranged to have a video of his speech broadcast live across the company's network to their global offices around the world. Well into his speech, delivered entirely in a tedious monotone, his EA realised that somehow the CEO had managed to unintentionally skip an entire page of text. Nobody else apparently noticed, because, in spite of the impressive technology, it is doubtful that they were actually listening. Technology has phenomenal power and potential to enrich communications strategies but it can't solve all your communications problems.

So, if you have two distant offices that you'd like to work better together, then putting in a video conferencing facility and a backbone network might be a good starter step. However, if the two offices actually detest each other, then that's the problem behind their sub-optimal work patterns. Technology may only succeed in making it easier for them to squabble face-to-face.

Distractions

In fact, technology can sometimes become an unintentional distraction. One executive's speech was played onto giant screens behind him on the stage - helpful for those at the back of the room. That went well until the camera zoomed in, went too far, got a superb close-up of his nostrils, then apparently stuck. For the next several seconds as the techies ran about frantically, the CEO concerned was rather overshadowed by giant close-ups of his nasal cavities on the screens behind him. Cue much hilarity and a major disruption to his speech.

Mechanics

Today's technology, even the entry-level systems, can now connect sites all over the world pretty much instantly. Information can flow easy and communications can be delivered even to people on the move via their mobile phone or PDA etc. All very impressive but if the message or images aren't right and don't form part of communications strategies in the broadest sense, then the technology may just make it easier for you to deliver the wrong message instantly to all the right people!

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