A manager writes long, dense emails to her next-in-command. He spends excessive time trying to figure out the main points. When he can’t decipher the emails, he talks with her to find out what she meant.An IT expert writes two-word answers to complex questions, leaving his reader in the dark about how to solve the problem. A staff member writes rambling messages to colleagues, who have learned to simply ignore everything she writes.
- These cases reflect real-life scenarios that people have shared in our business writing trainings.
What Are the Costs?
Many of us see communication problems and put up with them. But at what cost? Tolerating these habits costs:
Time: How many minutes a day are people in your organization spending trying to decode murky messages? Estimates range from 40 to 60 minutes per person per day, leading to thousands of wasted hours.
Turnover: When employees do not understand what is expected of them or do not feel understood, they become dissatisfied. This leads to an increase in turnover. Replacing one lost employee can cost the employee’s annual salary in addition to time spent training a replacement. How much communication-related turnover is plaguing your organization?
Efficiency: When people do not clearly understand written messages, they cannot do their jobs well. Unclear messages undermine your organization’s core functions, putting the business at risk.
Three Costly Communication Habits
Here are three written communication habits that cost organizations millions of dollars in time, turnover, and efficiency, along with steps you can take to alleviate them:Not Thinking of the Reader
In a recent leadership development training, we urged participants to think of their readers’ interests and needs. One manager raised his hand and asked plaintively, “Why do I have to think of the reader? Can’t I just make my point?” The answer is simple: If you don’t think of your reader, you cannot make your point. We communicate successfully when the reader understands us. If a person habitually does not consider the interests and language skills of the reader, it’s time to intervene.
What to Do:Ask the person if he feels his communication is as effective as he wants it to be. Odds are that it is not. Point out that the receiver gets to vote on whether we have conveyed our message. In order to get their vote, we need to ask ourselves a few questions before we write:- What does my reader care about?
- What does my reader need to know?
- Will my reader understand my words?
Not Getting to the Point
In our surveys of business executives, rambling ranks high among the most infuriating habits. Busy people need writers to get to the point within the first 40 words, and to stay on point throughout a document.
What to Do: If a person habitually rambles, give him clear feedback about the problem. Teach him to identify the main point of every document before he starts to write. Get him a writing coach or send him to a writing training.
Giving Incomplete Information
When we give incomplete information, we develop pen pals as people keep peppering us with requests for more information. If you want a pen pal, write to someone in a foreign country; don’t cultivate one at work. Technical experts, customer service representatives, and sales representatives must pay special attention to giving their readers enough information to act on. If you have staff members who regularly send terse emails that leave the reader hanging, confront the issue.What to Do:Giving sufficient information requires the writer to heed our first two points: He must know his key points before he starts to write and present the answer in language the reader will understand. Remind the person that rushing to give an incomplete answer ultimately takes more time than being comprehensive.
Don’t Live with Bad Communication Habits
Ask yourself, “What bad communication habits am I tolerating in my organization? How much is it costing me to put up with the status quo, both in lost time and lost business? What can I do to resolve these issues?”
Begin by communicating better with your staff about what you expect from their communication. Take the time to train and coach your most problematic communicators. Follow up on training initiatives to ensure that learning is implemented. Do this and you will quickly see an upsurge in energy and creativity as people understand their work more clearly.If you want to start saving millions of dollars in time, turnover, and efficiency, schedule a call with Worktalk. We can support you in overcoming the costly communication habits that are holding your organization back.