Effective communication is crucial for the success of any business. For the interaction of management and employees, business communication is vital. Organizational communication has played an invaluable role during the ongoing COVID pandemic in reducing the uncertainties for employees about their organization’s direction and decisions during this difficult time, which continues for all of us.
Communication is central in every organization. The challenge is to communicate as effectively as possible in this changing world. Equally challenging is the fact that every business person thinks they are a good communicator, and therefore it can be difficult for professional communicators to be heard against the barrier of pre-conceived management notions – and poor management skills. A key step to improve this situation is for communicators to speak more of the language of business so they influence leaders and other executives.
Business communicators need to balance short-term, action-oriented needs – the common management attitude that communicators are order-takers – and long-term strategic planning. Good business communication improves business performance through contributing to employee engagement and change management.
Business communication
Broad directions of business communication – here are some basic types of business communication:
- Downward communication. Communication from a higher level to a low level in the company.
- Upward communication. Flow of information from low level to top management and managers.
- Horizontal or lateral communication. This type of information spreads from peer to peer most of the time. You can share your ideas and feelings with your group and peers. You can learn things from your peers.
- External information. This involves the customers and all external parties to whom you communicate for business purposes. A recent trend is that professional communicators have been playing a more active role in marketing communication to support the marketing function and the role of external agencies. There are many agencies which help you to engage the external marketplace, such as London PPC agency with effective communication strategy and enhance your business visibility. The digital ad marketplace experienced record-breaking growth in 2021, according to industry sources. This trend included a big gain of 33% in US search ad revenue and buoyant growth in other English-speaking countries.
Communication channels and sources
A wide range of communication channels and sources is available in this era:
- Face-to-face contact and meetings
- Video conference calls
- Telephone conference calls
- ‘Town hall’ gatherings of all employees
- Podcasts
- Traditional written communication such as letters, memos, reports, etc
- Text messages
- Voicemail
- Blogs and articles
- Internal and external publications, including marketing material
- Internal and external social media
- Intranet
- Surveys, focus groups etc of employee, customer and other stakeholder attitudes
- Media monitoring and listening for changes in marketplace trends
- Grapevine, rumor and gossip chat
Importance of business communication
Here are some benefits of business communication which reflect its importance:
A better way to gain knowledge
Knowledge is necessary to accomplish any task in the organization. If your communication is effective within the organization, your business can grow and your employees can get more knowledge.
Seniors communicate with the juniors in any organization, the way of their communication will be impressive and effective, you can get more knowledge and experience otherwise it is not possible to get knowledge.
Enhances productivity
Productivity is necessary to get competitive advantages. If your communication is effective and knowledgeable, it will enhance the productivity of the employees.
Business does many things to enhance productivity, they offer a different lucrative package for this purpose. If they focus on this non-monetary technique, they can increase the productivity of the employees. They get extra outputs with little inputs.
Provides a sense of ownership and loyalty to employees
Every organization wants loyal employees. If you listen to the grieves of the employees effectively, it makes your employee more loyal. The sense of ownership will increase among employees which is very important for the success of any business.
This thing also helps you in employee retention. You can retain your employee with little effort. Otherwise, it is a very hard task to retain an employee. But if you are caring about them and do things better for them, they will not leave the organization without any major reasons.
Customer satisfaction
Customers are also assets of your organization that give you monetary benefits. If you don’t effectively communicate with your customer, you can lose them. This act will destroy your business and you have to face many financial issues to run your business.
Photo by Domenico Loia on Unsplash
Kim J. Harrison has authored, edited, coordinated, produced and published the material in the articles and ebooks on this website. He brings his experience in professional communication and business management to provide helpful insights to readers around the world. His wide-ranging career includes roles as a corporate affairs manager, consultant, author, lecturer and business manager. Kim has received several international media relations awards and a website award. He has been quoted in The New York Times and various other news media, and has held elected positions with his State and National PR Institutes.
