Communication: The Key to Performance - 12 Oct 2009

Communication: The Key to Performance

  Sheila Embry and Richard Schuttler

http://www.clomedia.com/talent.php?pt=a&aid=2776

According to a recent study by the U.S. Department of Homeland
Security, the best way to improve employee and organizational
performance is to improve supervisor communication.

The study
examined the relationship between leadership communication and employee
performance. The survey had participants choose responses based on the
Supervisor Leadership and Communication Inventory (SLCI), which uses a
traffic-light metaphor introduced by Richard Schuttler in his book Laws
of Communication: The Intersection Where Leadership Meets Employee
Performance. The metaphor categorizes organizations as red, yellow and
green on a two-dimensional grid. The theoretical framework allows
managers to identify critical concerns in red, elements needing to be
watched in yellow and elements working well in green.

The
majority of survey participants chose yellow responses for leadership
and leader communication. Employees in the yellow zone are identified
as floundering from lack of clear direction. There is a general feeling
of “anything goes” that produces mediocre performances, internal
competition and single-loop learning.

These actions are in
response to misaligned objectives from inconsistent leadership. Survey
participants believed their leaders were making either haphazard or
overly quick responses, rather than proactive, strategic decisions. If
supervisors increase their leadership and communication skills, they
likely can increase employee and organizational performance.

The
survey also revealed a gap between perceptions of leadership from field
employees and headquarters employees, even though the same survey was
made available to all employees. Approximately 80 percent of the
participants were from the field, and approximately 20 percent were
employees working at headquarters. The study revealed that field
employees had consistently lower perceptions than headquarters
employees.

Comments from the qualitative portion of the
mixed-method study indicated that field employees did not believe their
voices were being heard; they felt that their memos and requests for
guidance went unanswered; and they wanted headquarters leadership to
require proof from local leadership that headquarters communications
were distributed to field employees because they believed they were not
receiving important information from senior leadership. Some
respondents believed local leadership held on to senior communication
and distributed it on a “need to know” basis rather promoting
transparency.

Still others felt there was a detrimental
disconnect between local management and headquarters, stating they
would “get in trouble with local management despite headquarters’
approval.” These findings are comparable to a study within another DHS
agency whose participants stated that local leaders felt empowered to
do what they wanted despite headquarters’ directives and policies.

Leaders
should seriously consider this finding and reassess their strategy for
communicating with local leadership and field employees.

An
unexpected finding from this study was the comparison between
participants who responded to the survey from an electronic invitation
and those who picked up paper fliers distributed in employee cafeterias
and break rooms. People who learned of the survey from paper fliers in
break rooms and cafeterias rated their supervisors’ leadership and
communication lower than those who responded to the survey from
electronic invitations. Significant differences were found between the
average communication score, the average leadership score and the
average outcome score. There were no significant differences between
the average employee performance score, however.

This research
reaffirms findings from a 2007 study by the Partnership for Public
Service and a 2008 study by the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board,
which listed poor leadership and lack of effective communication as
reasons for low employee engagement. The study also suggests that if
leaders and supervisors work on moving their leadership and, more
importantly, their communication out of the yellow zone and into the
green zone, employee engagement could increase, leading to higher
employee job satisfaction and performance, better organizational
performance and decreased turnover.