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Good communication is one of the keys to productivity within a business. Unfortunately, most organizations don’t have the right technological infrastructure to support a good communication strategy.
If you can become the exception to this rule, you’ll never suffer from a lack of productivity again.
The Benefits of Good Internal Communication
Strong internal communication is more than a nice-to-have. It’s a must-have. It’s something that you need to prioritize at every level of your organization. In doing so, you’ll enjoy better:
- Engagement. When employees know what’s expected of them, they feel more engaged. This naturally leads to better productivity, improved output, and a whole host of other ancillary benefits.
- Retention. Engaged employees are much less likely to jump ship and move on to another company. They’ll happily stick around and look for additional opportunities internally before seeking out a new employer.
- Transparency. Employees are tired of being kept in the dark. They want to work for organizations that treat them with respect. A good internal communications establishes transparency and respect.
- Control. From a leadership perspective, having good internal communication allows you to control the messages that circulate within your organization. This empowers you to control the narrative, rather than having other people share damaging gossip and rumors.
When it’s all said and done, these benefits culminate in greater employee satisfaction and healthier customer service. Ignore the importance of internal communication at your own risk.
4 Internal Communication Tools You Need
The good news is that you don’t have to create and implement a communication strategy on your own. There are plenty of tools that make it easy to facilitate smooth internal communication in different facets of your business. Here are some good options to consider:
1. SMS for Teams
When possible, it’s better to rely on tools that your team is already comfortable with than to introduce a brand new platform that requires a learning curve. And if there’s one mode of communication that we all know and love, it’s text messaging.
SMS software might not be the first thing you think about for internal business communications, but it’s an effective one. Research shows that emails enjoy a 98 percent open rate (compared to just 15 to 20 percent for emails). Not only that, but 91 percent of your employees have their phone within reach 24 hours a day. As a result, 9-in-10 text messages are opened within 15 minutes of receiving.
Tools like TextMarks are designed exclusively for business purposes. It can be used to send event reminders, notify staff of emergencies, coordinate schedules, or even solicit employee feedback.
2. Social Intranet
If you’re looking for a centralized platform to keep your team engaged at all times, a social intranet is a great tool to have. It’s basically a virtual workplace that allows team members to communicate, share files, access company knowledge and resources, collaborate on projects, and more. Best of all, you can sync it up with your cloud drive to keep everyone on the same page (regardless of location).
3. Project Management Applications
Not interested in a social intranet? At the very least, you should consider a project management application that allows you to keep teams on the same page in regards to specific assignments and deliverables. Asana is a great platform to try.
4. Employee Surveys
It’s important that you’re able to gather as much feedback from your team as possible. This helps you make educated decisions about implementing new rules, procedures, and technology.
We highly recommend implementing a real-time employee engagement solution for gathering feedback and monitoring specific metrics. Armed with the right information, you can turn actionable insights into proactive decisions.
Set Your Business Apart
If you have two companies that sell the same basic products at a similar price point to an identical market, you’d assume that they’d perform roughly the same. But if one organization has a strong internal communication strategy and the other does not, their bottom lines will look very different.
You want to be the kind of company that prioritizes healthy communication from the inside out. And in order to do this in 2022 and beyond, you need to rely on technology. Whether it’s a social intranet or SMS software, having the right tools in place can give you the edge you need to thrive.
