Benefits and Challenges to Internal Communication in Business

Once the organization establishes proper communication among employees, no idea will ever fall through again. 

It is every employer’s dream to see their business prosper and thrive. More often than not, their great ideas for growth and success fall through owing to miscommunication. Ineffective and poor internal communication lies behind most of the unaccomplished goals of the organization.

Employers spend so much time on developing effective external communication strategies neglecting the key to success — internal communication. The way employers and employees communicate affects productivity, teamwork, engagement, experience, and the overall prosperity of the organization. 

Given its growing importance in business, let’s see which are the benefits and challenges to internal communication. 

Benefits

Good internal communication positively affects corporate spheres regarding employee engagement, communication, and connection. With those and many other benefits, it is no wonder many companies have decided to implement effective internal communication strategies. 

1. Spreads the Word 

One of the more obvious reasons for the growing importance of internal communication is information sharing. The business goes through numerous changes every day. To keep track and not lose sight of the corporate aims, the employers should keep the employees in the loop at all times. Unexpected changes in the schedule, newly introduced measures, and latest news spread much faster and easier through the company’s intranet portal. This practice will keep everyone on the same page and reinforce the open and honest policy which employees particularly value. 

2. Gets Employees Engaged

Internal communication is more than just communicating raw ideas to the teams and departments. The key to creating an effective communication network is encouraging a two-way conversation from top to bottom. Employee engagement can range from asking questions, asking for help, or simply sharing the updates on the work in progress. Giving and receiving feedback instead of just providing directions and orders makes a huge difference for employees. The employees whose voices are heard and opinions appreciated will go the extra mile for the company if needed. 

3. Eases the Crisis

With constant market fluctuations and the ongoing pandemic, employees all around the world fear for their jobs. Timely and transparent communication is fundamental in keeping employees calm during the crisis. Internal communication can be turned into a favorable setting for such difficult conversations and announcements. Employees will appreciate complete honesty and gentle tone. Also, their questions should be answered promptly. Transparent and empathetic employers create an optimistic atmosphere that may help ease the crisis and withstand the difficult period.

Challenges

Despite believing good internal communication is the top priority in business, most employers lack long-term strategies for their implementation. Some of the reasons might be the radical challenges they face on the road to establishing effective communication. Most common obstacles are the following ones:

• Communicating with Different Generations

In recent years, the business world has been witnessing the most diverse and multigenerational workforce ever. There is an obvious lack of knowledge when it comes to communication tools and platforms. For this reason, connecting and communicating with employees has been particularly difficult. Employers have to determine which distribution channel works best for them. Also, they have to provide thorough employee training on the selected channel. This way, every employee will be in the loop of the most recent events in the company. 

• Keeping Employees Actively Engaged

Employees working remotely from different parts of the world often pose a problem for establishing proper internal communication. It is challenging for businesses, especially the large ones, to timely supply all their employees with relevant and accurate information. Furthermore, since the internal communication channel connects all employees, hundreds of messages are being exchanged daily. Some of them are long, detailed, and informative. Most people find it hard to keep track and actively participate all the time. Because of this, adding some media content, such as graphs, pictures, or voice messages, could help break those long pieces of writing. 

• Taking Up Suggestions

Although internal communication is a hotbed of ideas, suggestions, and feedback, many of them usually fall flat. While employee engagement is great for business, some organizations fail to act on their propositions. In such cases, employees lose self-esteem and feel disrespected. They lose the will to work and they don’t feel a part of the corporate culture. These feelings negatively reflect on their productivity and work performance. To avoid such a scenario, HR managers should take into account employees’ opinions and actively work on implementing their ideas and suggestions.

Overall, establishing effective internal communication takes time and effort. Businesses face difficult challenges when trying to implement efficient internal communication strategies. However, given its great benefits, in the long run, all of the hard work will pay off. Once the organization establishes proper communication among employees, no idea will ever fall through again.