A team leader or business owner without good communication skills can lead to a slump in employee productivity. Ideas may not be clearly defined and as a consequence projects may fail to meet deadlines. By making small and simple adjustments you can turn this around, not just for the leader but for the whole team. We look at how to improve communication in the workplace so you can boost productivity and have more positive business outcomes. Learn more about transitioning from office to cloud culture.

For starters, try these small and simple adjustments around the workplace for more effective team communication.

1. Clarify roles & responsibilities

Identify your team and make sure that everyone is clear about roles and responsibilities. This will help to streamline office communication, so people know who to talk to if they need information. Often productivity can be boosted by simply having clear reporting lines.

2. Give feedback

Constructive feedback for your team is important because it pinpoints areas that employees need to work on. It also gives them a chance to communicate how you can help them improve. Do they need guidance or more creative freedom to perform better? Having a culture of open dialogue makes it easier for there to be a two-way conversation.

3. Give praise

Everyone likes to be acknowledged for their efforts, and giving praise is a simple way to inspire more productivity within your team. Praise can be given by virtual or verbal feedback to acknowledge individual team members or to the whole team as a public act of appreciation. In fact, research by Globoforce showed 69% of employees say they would work harder if they were better appreciated and recognized.

4. Keep everyone on the same page

Provide good communication platforms so employees can share updates, ideas, questions and concerns. A study by the McKinsey Global Institute showed organisations with connected employees have a boost in productivity by 20-25%. Platforms such as Slack and Asana can help keep everyone stay in regular contact and on the same page, as well as manage tasks and project workflows. This reduces the need for long emails (which people might not read) and regular meetings (where people might tune out).

Benefits of investing in strong communication skills

Working on your communication skills can not only achieve better productivity for you as a leader or business owner but also for your employees and how they engage with each other. Creating a workplace culture that values effective communication will help everyone to:

• Work together more cohesively
• Be more comfortable engaging with each other
• Make tasks and projects crystal clear so there are less errors
• Manage diversity within the team and different personality types
• Be more transparent around discussing and dealing with issues

Want to learn how to improve communication in the workplace?

If you want a noticeable long-term transformation in your workplace, it’s best to invest in professional communication training for you and your team. When you invest in their communication skills it:

• Yields a bigger impact on your team’s productivity
• Helps them to build confidence in their abilities
• Inspires everyone for greater workplace productivity and
• Achieves more positive business outcomes.

After sending a team from ANZ to our training program, Capability and Performance Manager, Michael Ziccone told us “there [had] been a noticeable uplift in our sales performance, resilience and morale, as our employees recognise the time and investment ANZ has made in their personal development.”