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January 20, 2012

Five Ways to Improve Internal Communication

By David Vaughan, Director of Projects, TSG Global

Businesses communicate in many ways and usually the core focus is always external.  Advertisements, email campaigns, invoices, the list can go on, but usually never very high on the list and/or effective are a business's internal communications. The difficulty with turning this oversight around is very slight as long as it starts at the top and works its way down.  



The benefits of more effective internal chit-chat reaped go well beyond the cubicle or corner office.  The benefits will be visible all the way to your customers and clients because hopefully it will effortlessly relay to people inside and outside your business that they belong to a community.

First you should examine these questions:

  • What methods of communication are currently being used?
  • What information is being communicated in each channel currently being used?
  • How well do present systems fulfill the communications objectives?
  • What additional resources are required?

Once you have asked (and answered those questions) you can ask, what are some ways to make these internal collaborations more effective? Listed are five ways that hopefully can get you on the right track. There is no specific order for rank or importance and perhaps your business does not need them all.  However, what I can strongly advise is to make sure you are incorporating one well before you look to implement another.

1. Social Media. Twitter, Facebook (News - Alert), LinkedIn and Google+ are all wonderful platforms that should be welcomed as a part of internal communications.  The ease of being able to share as well as be informed easily will bring you connected together. Google (News - Alert)+ even offers Hangouts which are great ways to have "water cooler" sessions when people are not available in the same location.

2. Open Forum. "Water Cooler" - Informal micro meetings can produce information and inspiration as long as they are random, frequent and small enough that everyone can have a voice.  Making note of what is said and taking action when required falls right into place with this plan.  Increased response time creates a huge benefit from knowing about dissatisfied customers, to unhappy reactions or to a new employee policy, will guarantee an understanding of where the company is at that moment. A major factor to this tool is to make sure all participants feel they can share without ridicule or judgment.

3. Appropriate Audience (News - Alert) Content. This means, make sure the what, who, how and when are being communicated and are reaching the appropriate audience.  An email with content obviously geared to the accounts payable department does not need the IT department included on it (unless it is something IT related and that department would be involved).  How does this help improve communications?  Trust me, when you get emails that are relevant to you vs. getting emails that the majority of times are not relevant to you, the relevant emails will be opened more often and given the intended attention you desire.  

4. Company newsletter. Post it on a website, send out an email, tweet it.  However you choose to deliver it, make sure it is frequent and most of all, short.  The longer a newsletter, the more words you have to come up with.  As for the frequency, every couple of weeks to once a month is sufficient.

5. Company Blog. Invite employees to contribute to your company blog.  That's right, open it up and discover the underlying and often hidden talents your company never knew it had.  The key, open it to everyone and let it fly.  If you’re worried about the content someone may put in, make sure you have rules in place to eliminate possible issues of discrimination or language, but otherwise let what comes forth be heard - even if it talks bad about a product of the company.  Trust me, if one person on staff is thinking something is done wrong then there are a ton of people outside the company saying the same thing.  This type of open honesty is exactly what Robert Scoble did while with Microsoft (News - Alert) when talking about how the Firefox web browser was actually better than Microsoft's Internet Explorer web browser.  It actually made the goliath corporation seem more human for not only making mistakes but talking about them.

There are more ways and means to improve the internal connections in the company, but these are one's I found to be more beneficial.  Remember, its people both inside and outside that make the company possible and if no one is talking, then how do you know where you stand in the grand scheme of success.  I would love to hear what others think.

Want to learn more about the latest in communications and technology? Then be sure to attend ITEXPO East 2012, taking place Jan. 31-Feb. 3 2012, in Miami, FL. ITEXPO (News - Alert) offers an educational program to help corporate decision makers select the right IP-based voice, video, fax and unified communications solutions to improve their operations. It's also where service providers learn how to profitably roll out the services their subscribers are clamoring for – and where resellers can learn about new growth opportunities. For more information on registering for ITEXPO registration click here.

Stay in touch with everything happening at ITEXPO. Follow us on Twitter.


David Vaughan is an industry veteran of telecom, now Director of Projects at TSG Global, Inc. To read more of David's articles, please visit his columnist page.

Edited by Stefanie Mosca
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