A checklist for communicating leaders' decisions
Seven questions that need to be answered before communicating a decision from the top.
by Kevin Eikenberry, chief potential officer, The Kevin Eikenberry Group
Leaders know that communication is one of their key roles. In fact, whenever I've worked with a leadership team or group the subject of communication always comes up. People want to know how to communicate more effectively, and why people don’t always seem to hear when they do communicate.
In those very same organizations people wish the leaders would communicate more often and/or more clearly. They often feel “in the dark” about decisions, plans and future direction.
In defense of the leaders, most of the time they do communicate, but often not very effectively. In fact, by definition, if the followers aren't clear about what they've read or heard, then the communication hasn’t been effective.
One of the areas where the gap is widest is in communicating decisions. Decisions are made (or followers think or assume they've been made), but the communication of those decisions is ineffective or incomplete.
Communicating decisions checklist
In working with a management team recently we examined this challenge and found a document that outlined some things to consider when communicating decisions. What follows are seven questions to help you successfully communicate leaders' decisions within your organization, both internally and externally.
1. What are the key points or major messages you want to share when communicating the decision?
Outline these points ahead of time. If each member of a leadership team is communicating individually, creating a common list of key messages is even more important. What do you really need to communicate about this decision?
2. How is this decision connected to/in alignment with our strategies, vision, mission and values?
Your leaders have (hopefully) made decisions taking the company's strategies, mission, vision and/or values in mind. Since they may have struggled through the decision from these perspectives, these connections may seem obvious to them and to you as a communicator. But they won’t necessarily be as obvious to your audience. Help the audience see the connections and the relevance of this decision to the long-term picture of the organization.
3. Have we answered the “why?” to this decision?
People need to understand why. Too often leaders describe the what, but never address the why. Knowing why helps people hear, understand and accept a decision.
4. Who will provide the communication?
As a communication function, you may be crafting the messages and creating the communication strategy, but who will deliver the decision? Is one executive making the announcement or is internal communication sending the email to everyone within the organization? Is each individual manager sharing the message with their groups separately? Is there some combination of both? Purposely decide who will be communicating.
5. How will it be communicated (what's the best medium)?
The communication channel will be different in different situations. Consider the message, its implications and the audience before automatically determining the approach or doing what you always do.
6. When (or by when) will it be communicated?
Chances are the sooner the better. Even if you don’t have complete information, give people what you do have as soon as possible. If communicating separately, some agreements on when the communication will be completed are important – to make sure some pockets of the organization don’t have the information far ahead of others.
7. What will be the process to check for understanding?
We know that communication is a two–way process. A complete communication plan makes sure that people have gotten the message and that they understand it. This implies that an email alone may not be enough. To be most successful, you need to create some sort of feedback mechanism or dialogue.
As you can see the biggest key to communicating leadsership decisions is to make sure we communicate the right information at the right time in the right way. For your future decisions use this checklist to help make sure you are communicating completely and therefore powerfully.
Kevin Eikenberry is a leadership expert and the Chief Potential Officer of The Kevin Eikenberry Group, a learning consulting company that helps Clients reach their potential through a variety of training, consulting and speaking services. You can learn more about him and a special offer on his newest book, Remarkable Leadership: Unleashing Your Leadership Potential One Skill at http://RemarkableLeadershipBook.com/bonuses.asp
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