Leadership

Six Keys to Better Communication and Better Financial Performance

By Jessica Stillman

Updated on: December 5, 2007 / 1:05 PM EST / MoneyWatch

Our recent post centered on a Harvard Business Review IdeaCast about what skills managers were missing got a lot of attention. Managers, it seems, want to know what's more important--soft communication skills or more hard-hosed traits like perseverance? Global Consulting firm Watson Wyatt weighed in yesterday with its 2007/2008 Communication ROI study. It found:

"Companies with the most effective communication programs had a 47 percent higher total return to shareholders from 2002 to 2006, compared with companies that communicate least effectively."

Nothing spurs managers to action like an opportunity to improve the bottom line, but what exactly should you do to reap the benefits of improved communication? Watson Wyatt laid out six key practices of high performing companies:

Focusing managers and other employees on customer needs
Engaging employees in running the business
Helping managers communicate effectively
Leveraging the talents of internal communicators to manage change effectively
Measuring the impact of employee communication
Branding the employee experience

And if you really want to see dramatic improvement, allow your employees to give feedback on issues that affect them. Only one in five companies do this, but companies with the best financial performance are ten times more likely to let their employees have their say.

(Image of keys by takacsi75, CC 2.0)