Article by Maddison Coaching associate Natasha Spencer-Jolliffe
Communication in business is important as it offers a platform for individuals and teams to build relationships and define who they are as an organisation, what messages they are sending out and what sets them apart from all the other businesses.
1. Build, Nurture and Maintain Customer Relationships
Communication is used in our business interactions and as such is an important tool for many reasons, fundamentally it enables us to build and maintain relationships with our clients and customers. We can build a rapport with them by using effective two-way communication and this in turn fosters great customer relationships.
2. Show Your Values and Define your Brand
The importance of communication on the perspective of customer relationships is that they can learn what it is you as a company are offering and you as the company can use communication to define and promote your brand. This is important as it enables you to show your values and enables the customer to connect with who you are and what you stand for, which will result in better relationships and will increase your value.
3. Build Trust
By having effective communication with your customers and enabling them to see your values through your brand you foster relationships, but you can also build trust with them and ensure the relationship is built on transparency.
4. Feedback
This works in both ways, it is important for employees to be able to offer their insight into projects, what works well and what doesn’t but also for the management of the company to let their employees know what is expected of them and what targets are to be met.
5. Clearly Defined Projects, Expectations and Deadlines.
Communication also must exist in companies on an organisational level as effective communication in teams can help to clearly define projects and targets, as well as tasks to be completed and deadlines.
6. Encourages Creative and Strategic Thinking
Brainstorming with your team and sharing ideas can also support creativity and help to develop new ideas and strategies. It encourages all to be involved. Open and inclusive communication should be encouraged in all businesses to help nurture employees but also help with adding new concepts, products, services to the business.
7. Increased Productivity
By using effective communication your organisation will have increased productivity as when everyone knows what they are doing, what is expected of them it saves valuable time and increases efficiency.
8. Prevent Conflict
Open communication in the form of face to face in teams can also help to reduce or prevent conflict, if your team are all talking openly and directly with themselves then any issues that may arise can be dealt with in a quicker manner and will help to nurture a happy environment, this will again increase the overall productivity.
9. Support Change
For organisations to be able to offer their customers a great service and be sustainable they must be open to change. By having effective communication at this process, they can clearly inform their customers of these changes and inform the team who will be able to implement them.
10. Non-Verbal Communication
It is important to remember that communication can be used in many ways, this can be through verbal and nonverbal interactions. Studies show that only 7% of communication is conveyed through spoken words and a staggering 55% is through non-verbal factors such as body language. It is therefore vital that a business and its teams learn how they conduct themselves and what impression their nonverbal cues give off. It could be a simple look that could mean that a team member is not happy, they could then in turn pass this attitude on to a customer, which will negatively affect your overall image as a business and can be irreparable.
What Happens in the Event there is a Breakdown of Communication?
If there is a breakdown of communication in business in can have severe negative effects on an individual’s overall wellbeing but also damaging on the organisation. When this does occur its best to seek support. Perhaps you need to look at how to manage conflict, or how to be more assertive, how to ask for help or how to best define what you need from your team, or perhaps you need support with defining your brand and business. There are many solutions out there when there has been a breakdown of communication from working with a business coach to looking at getting support with your content and overall message. The important thing to remember is to communicate, speak up get support.