Leadership is a conversation
The command and control approach to management has in recent years becomes less and less viable. Globalization, new technologies, and changes in how companies create value and interact with customers have sharply reduced the efficacy of a purely directive, top down model of leadership. What will take the place of that model? Part of the answer lies in how leaders manage communication within their organizations-that is, how they handle the flow of information to, from, and among their employees. Traditional corporate communication must give way to a process that is more dynamic and more sophisticated. Most important, that process must be conversational.
On conducting a recent research project that focused on the state of organizational communication. About 150 people from more than 100 companies mentioned their efforts to have a conversation with the people or to advance the conversation within their companies.
There are basically four main elements of organizational conversation. Intimacy: Getting Close
Leaders should minimize the distance between them and the workers (employees) of the organization in order to earn the trust of their employees.
Conversational intimacy can be helpful to the organization in many ways such as:
Gaining trust: Where there is no trust, there can be no intimacy. It is important for the leaders to gain the trust of the employees for proper functioning of the organizational works.
Listening well: Leaders who take organizational conversation seriously know when to stop talking and start listening. Leaders must be a good listener also; he should listen to what people have to say.
Getting personal: Leaders should not only invite people to raise concerns about the company but also solicited feedback on his own performance. True listening involves taking bad with the good, absorbing criticism even when it is direct and personal.
THE NEW REALITIES OF LEADERSHIP COMMUNICATION
Interactivity: Promoting Dialogue
It involves an exchange of comments and questions between two or more people. One side speaking is not termed as conversation. Leaders talks to the employees and not just to them in an organizational conversation. It makes the conversation open and fluid rather than closed and directive.
Inclusion: Expanding Employees’ Roles
Personal conversation is an equal opportunity to endeavor. They can put their own ideas into the conversation. During the spirit of inclusion, engaged employees can adopt new roles, creating content themselves and acting as brand ambassadors, thought leaders, and storytellers.
Brand ambassadors: When employees love their company’s product and services they become a living representative of their brand.
Thought leaders: Companies rely on consultants or in house professional for the drafting of speeches, articles, white papers to achieve leadership in knowledge based field.
Story tellers: When employees speak from their own experience, unedited, the message comes to life. Leaders look for ideas to improve their business performance.
Intentionality: Pursuing An Agenda
The participants in an open conversation will have some sense of what they wish to achieve. It differs from the other three in a way that all other serve to open up the flow of information within the company; intentionality brings closure to that process. It enables leaders and employees to derive strategically relevant action from the push and pull of discussion and debate.
Conversation goes on in every company, whether you recognize it or not. That has always been the case, but today the conversation has the potential to spread well beyond your wall, and it’s largely out of your control. Smart leaders find ways to use conversation to manage the flow of information in an honest, open fashion. People will listen to communication that is intimate, interactive, inclusive, and intentional.