2.5 Communication Best Practices

Be Transparent and Honest

To be transparent means to share your thoughts and opinions honestly in a respectful manner. When you are transparent, you form authentic connections with your coworkers because you mutually help each other and share information. Communication is clear so misinterpretation can be avoided.  Transparency and honesty build a culture where people feel free to ask more questions, request help, and explain their reasoning. 

Transparency and honesty is an important part of working with staff.  Some key ways in your role to be transparent include:

• Providing realistic time frames for repairs and resolution of a problem
• Not making promises that cannot be kept.
• If things happen beyond your control, keep users informed. 

While situations may be stressful or disappointing, if you are consistently transparent and honest people will be frustrated with the situation not because they doubt your honesty. 

Communicate for Understanding

Whether you are crafting a written message or speaking to someone in person, your primary goal is to communicate in a language that the other person can understand.  Beyond your technology team, you will need to assume that the people you work with do not know tech acronyms or terms.  Knowing WHO you are interacting with should guide HOW you interact with them.  

Some tips to help you communicate in ways others without a technology background will understand:

• Be patient. Patience will help keep you focused on the problem being communicated rather than your frustrations, plus it will build trust.
• Remember the individual's background. If you have had prior interactions with the person, keep in mind what you have learned about them from those interactions.  Do they understand tech jargon?  Does a little "hand-holding" encourage them to try trouble-shooting on their own? Does their body language indicate they want nothing to do with technology other than for it to work? This information will help you know how to keep your interactions efficient and productive, yet professional. 
• Be mindful of how others best communicate. We all have our preferred communication methods. For example, a person that always catches you in the hallways is probably more receptive to perceived bad news with an in-person conversation.
• Keep it simple. Most people do not need the history, trials and errors, and possible solutions to a problem; they just want it "fixed." Keep your communications factual yet simple, only providing additional details if asked for them. 
• Utilize images and video. Images and videos may be the best way to communicate in many situations. 

Proactive and Timely Communication

Providing your staff with timely communication means providing good customer service. Communication that is timely and proactive will leave a lasting impression on your staff by demonstrating you are working with them and assisting them in the best way possible. 

There are many ways you can be proactive and timely on a regular basis:

• Communicate about unexpected impactful issues. Don’t wait until you have received multiple emails and help tickets about a high-impact unexpected problem; instead take a couple minutes to send a mass email that communicates clearly the scope of the issue, the context of the issue, and when you expect resolution. Letting staff know you are aware and working on it is reassuring to them.

• Communicate about planned maintenance well in advance. Give staff plenty of time to plan when there are going to be downtimes or changes on the horizon. 

• Follow up after conversations. Create a system that helps you remember who to contact when you hear of a potential issue, whether it is from the person themselves or another individual sharing about it. A quick follow up email (or help ticket creation) will help reassure them that their issues are important and will be resolved.

• Follow up to ongoing work. Sending regular updates to issues that are taking longer to solve will provide reassurance that you are staying on top of the issue and it is not forgotten.

• Practice empathy. Empathy is the ability to understand what other people are feeling or experiencing; it is an understanding of how another's experiences are influencing what they are feeling and how those emotions might be impacting the way they are communicating with you. Empathy helps to understand the motivations that are influencing how they are acting.

• Manage expectations. Be clear and upfront about what you can and cannot do to solve an issue. Always keep customers in the loop about what you are working on and whether their request has to be escalated to another team member. Never make unreasonable claims about when issues will be resolved.

• Be consistent. If you are consistent in your approach, your process, and your communication, others will know what to expect from you and should learn what you expect from them. 

• Publicize accomplishments. As appropriate, sharing positive statistics, stories and accomplishments will help others to see that you support an entire district, and complete tasks that are essential for the district to be able to run smoothly.

Complete the following task or self-assessment:

Choose one or. two items from the lists in the information that you would like to work on.  

• Why did you pick that item (or those items?
• Write down a strategy for how you will work towards exemplifying that trait or characteristic. 

If you are struggling with ideas, approach a colleague or a friend and explain what you are working on and why;  ask for their ideas and input.