Getting Ahead of the Messaging Curve

Demonstrate leadership. You may have a written strategic plan and assume everybody in your firm sings from the same hymnal, but events are constantly in motion. In a marriage, it’s not good enough to say, “I love you” on only your wedding day. The message needs constant reinforcement. In your business, you must communicate regularly and clearly to prevent inaccurate or negative information from putting you behind the eight ball.

Leaders provide a sense of stability. Your employees probably sense that things may be changing for the worse, and you need to have an answer for how you plan to deal with emerging conditions. “Here's what we're doing. Here's how we're staying ahead of this situation. Here's how we're adapting to the new forecast."

Communicating about a changing future provides an opportunity to educate your employees. If you handed your employees your financial statement and balance sheet, they probably wouldn't know how to make heads or tails of them. For them, the forms may be simply an accounting formality, but thinking through your P&L and balance sheet numbers give you a chance to educate your employees about where your costs are. Put your costs into a pie chart by percentage, and let them see how hard it is to turn raw volume into profits. Some employees think if you gross $1 million that $900,000 falls to the bottom line, and we know that's not true in any kind of construction! Educating employees about how thin margins really are and how much care and effort it takes to eke out a little profit at the end of the year is a worthwhile endeavor.

Communication is not just a necessary evil. Many business owners think, “I don't need to be spoon-fed. Why do I need to spoon-feed this information to my employees?” But in the absence of information from their leaders, they’re going to make up things – and they will – which creates the potential for gossip, negativity, loss of momentum, and even the departure of key players. Leaders must grab the bull by the horns and deliver reality – maybe even harsh reality. You’ve got to control the message.