Why Your “Clear” Communication Isn’t Clear

Say there’s a new corporate initiative that your team needs to fully understand and embrace. You sit down with the team, sharing the details of the endeavor, and explain its importance. Then crickets. No questions, no nodding, just blank faces. What’s the problem? You know you communicated everything. You shared all the details. Why do they not get it?

As leaders, it’s not enough to take the orders from on high and simply regurgitate them to our teams. We need to add value. We need to add insights and details. We need to help them understand how that initiative impacts them and how they can engage. We need to help them identify questions that will help them understand the challenge more deeply. But because we have so much on our plates, there’s little time to sit down and do it. Besides, that’s the team’s job to figure it out, right?

Actually no. Without clarity, you risk creating confusion. What you say in a meeting may be interpreted differently than you intend, and that misunderstanding can easily ripple through the rest of the team. Think about every situation where you gave your team a new charge, and weeks go by only to find nothing has been accomplished. Was it that the team was too busy? Was it apathy? Or was it the fact that they didn’t really understand what was expected, much less how to go about getting things going?

This occurs because in every communication, every conversation, you have leak points—the gaps between the intent of your words and interpretation of them. These leaks occur when you fail to anticipate how different audience members might interpret your words based on their own context, experiences, and perspectives. They occur because what’s in your head may not effectively make it to the right words. It might not make it to the right phrasing. And in turn, there’s misunderstanding.

Leaders need to take time to consider those leak points and tailor their messages, based on the audience you’re speaking to and the context of the situation. Focusing on adding relevance to the individual or team’s role, goals, and challenges. This isn’t just how you frame it, but rather how you tailor the conversation to ensure understanding. Maybe it’s providing analogies. Maybe it’s providing exploratory questions. Maybe it’s discussing other operational elements that will impact or influence the initiative. Maybe it’s speaking to what some of the first steps might be. Or all of the above.

In short, your value as a leader doesn’t come simply from “taking the specifications from the customers, and bring them down to the software engineers”. It’s closing the communication leak points. It’s about being intentional in adding value to the communication process. I mean, as a leader, isn’t that really 90% of the job? Ensuring your teams are fully equipped with the right information and understanding to succeed. Because if you only regurgitate the information given to you, then “what would you say….you actually do here?”

About the Author

Trained as a behavioral scientist and customer-centricity expert, Andrea Belk Olson helps executives implement the art and science of operationalizing corporate strategy through understanding organizational mindsets. She is the author of three business books, including her most recent, What To Ask: How To Learn What Customers Need but Don’t Tell You.

She is a 4x ADDY award winner and contributing writer to Entrepreneur Magazine, Harvard Business Review, Rotman Magazine, World Economic Forum, and more. Andrea is also an entrepreneurial adjunct instructor at the University of Iowa and TEDx speaker coach.

More information is also available on www.pragmadik.com and www.andreabelkolson.com.