Editorials

Create a culture of communication

By Tom Hatlen

The 135-year-old business I left 20 years ago set the gold standard for how people need to work together in a company. It’s been a stark contrast to some things I’ve seen at other companies since.

I worked at The Banker’s Life insurance company, now The Principal Financial Group. They firmly believed in providing good service to “internal customers,” fellow employees. And they constantly reinforced it at meetings and with memos. There was a section on the performance review form for evaluating internal service.

The central thrust of the policy was that everyone in organization needed to be responsive to everyone else, and proactively communicate with them in a timely manner. That’s how you successfully manage a company of 14,000+ employees. It would definitely help small companies too.

I think there’s a tendency of small companies not to put much thought into how employees work together. This can lead to foolish mistakes and inefficiencies. No one told the office, or no one told the vendor or a key employee, so something didn’t get done, or was done wrong, or wasn’t coordinated with other things going on.

I’ve found it especially frustrating when I’ve had to rely on other employees who didn’t report to me. A report that could have been done in hours wasn’t done in 6 months with no explanation. No updates unless I asked. These things add up and hurt the company.

Better communication starts at the top. Employees need to be held accountable for “playing well with others” and keeping them in the loop. Everyone involved should be copied in with messages and timely updates. If something can’t be done on time, this needs to be explained in advance.

I once had a boss who was always late for meetings. The whole team, 6 of us, would wait in the meeting room for 20 minutes over and over again. Multiply the wages of all those waiting by the amount of time that’s wasted. Being late can be expensive.

Everyone, including the boss, needs to respect others’ time, and be on time for meetings. And everyone on the team needs to communicate to everyone else, even those they don’t report to. Establish an effective company working culture while your company is small, and it will pay dividends as you grow.