Effective communication for franchise owners and their team is critical for success. You, franchise owner, are your team’s leader. They look to you for answers, inspiration and expectations. It’s your responsibility to learn how to effectively communicate. This skill also reduces your stress if you ever wondered something like, “why won’t my team do as I ask,” or “Phil never listens to me when I ask him to be nicer to clients,” or worse yet, the rumor mill is the source for most information in your company.
There are 4 types and 6 objectives in organizational communications. Franchisees have their own styles but the basic communication types and objectives remain the same.
4 Types of Communication:
- Formal and informal – Formal communication is usually thought-out, written and filed for future reference. This information impacts your team in some way. Successful Franchisees documenting, communicating and preserving their systems is an example. Informal communication happens around the water cooler, in the break-room, or worse, it’s in the “grapevine.” This communication is mis-heard, translated wrong or many other negatives more often than not.
- The direction of communication is important. Is your audience your partner, a client, a colleague or your team?
- Internal versus external communication shapes the tone of your message.
- Your message can be written, oral or a combination and all should be consistent, concise and clear.
6 Objectives of Communication:
- Directive communication is like Tom Brady calling a play in the Patriot’s huddle. It’s you telling your team exactly how to get something accomplished. This objective should be used sparingly and cautiously in your business. If used too often or inappropriately, valuable input from your team goes away.
- Collaborative communication is a free-flowing conversation of ideas and adds impactful value. The Successful Franchisee knows they need help and seek it out. You are not an expert at everything. This objective can be leveraged in all directions when solving a specific issue or growing your business.
- Empathetic communication is simply being there when someone is having a fantastic day or one that’s amazingly bad. This is more emotional and lets your team, client or partner know you care about them. This, mostly verbal, communication is one-sided but the non-verbal communication speaks volumes from all involved.
- Informative communication teaches others something they want or need to know. Hopefully this article is a good example.
- Successful Franchisees will regularly communicate with their team on an inspirational level. Inspirational communication is Coach Luke Fickell inspiring his Cincinnati Bearcats to play the best football game of their lives 13 times so far this season. You inspire your team every day. Experience has taught me leading by example is more impactful than words.
- Passive communication is the message you convey when others watch your actions and results. It is your reputation. As a leader, don’t shy away from the spotlight. Successful Franchisees use this to strengthen their team’s confidence in their leadership.
8 Strategies for Impactful Communication
The following strategies for effective communication are not the end-all. They are a start to positively impactful communication with all who contribute to the success of your business.
- Evaluate and define the context of your assumptions. What the speaker may gloss over as “obvious” could be a key point for the listener. Assumptions can be difficult to identify. “Unspoken rules” in an organization need to be clearly defined. Speaking simply and using plain language helps alleviate assumptions. Warren Buffett said, “Never invest in a business you cannot understand.” The same is true for your communications. The best leaders I’ve worked for and with take the complex and transform it into simple concepts for all to understand.
- Intentionally reduce distractions.
- Communicate regularly with everyone in your organization so it’s routine. Pete won’t get overly anxious when you stop by his area to talk. Regular emails, tweets, even YouTube messages help keep your team engaged and less distracted by the anxiety of wonder.
- Choose the appropriate setting. Whether you’re communicating with your whole team or one-on-one with your GM, choose where to communicate with the least distractions.
- Have systems in all directions within your franchise for communication that requires immediate attention. Alcoa’s Paul O’Neil had a company vision to reduce workplace accidents to zero. Systems were established to notify him personally no matter what time a lost-time accident occurred.
- Intend to understand by listening 3x’s more than you speak.
- In one-on-one or small group settings where you are trying to discover something, focus on listening and be in the moment. This takes practice. The challenge is to not have other thoughts while someone is speaking. This includes thinking about the next question.
- Listening with the intent to understand will allow your team to find their own solutions. Acknowledge the speaker and ask open-ended questions to better understand. Yes/no questions shut down conversations.
- Pauses in conversations are often positive. It gives the listener time to form their next statement or question. Rapidly paced back and forth communication is nothing more than 2 competing monologues.
- Ask questions.
- Effective communication is usually two-way. Ask open-ended questions and allow time for the response when an idea is not fully developed. Open-ended questions lead to deeper answers.
- Asking pertinent questions lets the speaker know you are listening.
- Focus on objective behaviors to temper emotions. This skill is difficult. Everyone has their own personality. Successful Franchisees focus communication on objective behaviors that are both beneficial and those needing correction. Personal attacks stop two-way communication and can’t be tolerated in your business.
Reducing frustrations allows open communication. Acknowledge these in the beginning and any that may come up during the conversation. When there’s no way to avoid emotions, it’s best to use an approach like “it makes me feel ___ when you ___.” Emotions are acknowledged and the communication focuses back on objective behaviors. - Pay attention to what isn’t said and how you and your audience are saying it. You do not need to be a micro-facial expert to be able to read your audience. Engagement or lack of is easy in larger groups. You can read the expressions of a few individuals and see the overall effect of your communication on the group. In smaller groups, a Successful Franchisee can dig deeper into body language, posture, hand/arm gestures and facial expressions.
- Look for common ground when dealing with conflicts and build. For those situations with extra tensions and emotions, have an escape plan and allow a cooling-off period before resuming.
- Practice and ask for feedback. Impactful communication is a skill with a shelf-life. Take one of these skills and make a conscious effort to practice. Ask for feedback on your progress. In time, effective and impactful communication will be common place for you and your team.
Make a plan to improve your communication skills. Step-by-step positive results will happen for you and your team.
