Forums

I am challenged with communications in a “Mom & Pop” vs Big Corporate Entity.
 
Recently my IT-manager said that my communication skills at this Corporate Entity is inadequate. About 98% of my professional career was at “one man shows” i.e. a business owner with <=10 employees. Communication lines was short & to the point. A job was communicated from him to me, and executed by myself.
 
At the Corporate Entity my colleagues walks & informs the IT Manager about everything, from small details such as “Batch file from supplier Y failed to load”. They inform him of everything in great details, just short of him actually doing the job. By figure of speech if they go get a coffee they inform him of doing so.  I never hear other departments communicate this way, if ever!
 
We have a weekly IT Team Meeting & also 1-on-1’s.
 
Totally new to me was having an IT Manager, and this way Communicating in a Corporate Entity.
 
Questions;
1. Is this micro communications normal? 
2. How is communications done in your team?
3. What is communicated, how often?
 

mattpalmer's picture

Ultimately, it doesn't matter how my team communicates with me, or if what you're experiencing is "normal" -- if your boss wants communication that frequently, you need to deal with that somehow.  Saying "Well, this guy on the Internet says his team does something else" is totally not the right way to do that.

First off, consider that perhaps what your boss is asking for is effective.  As you say, you *don't* have experience at this scale, and it is certainly true that as organisations get bigger and the hierarchy gets longer and more solid, communication has to become more deliberate.  In your mom/pop culture, you were probably communicating just as much info, but it was mostly done subconsciously.  In larger organisations, that doesn't work as well, because subtle communication doesn't "travel" well.  There's also the possibility that you've been undermanaged in the past, so your frame of reference is skewed, and the level of communication you're observing is reasonable and proper.  I certainly think that there's nothing wrong with asking directs to communicate task completion and potential roadblocks on a regular basis.

If your boss *is* requesting massive overcommunication, you need to talk to him about it.  Thankfully, he's already opened the door for that discussion by telling you that your communication skills are inadequate.  Be thankful that you got told, so you can fix it, instead of just being shown the door.  I assume that you were told this within the last few days to a week.  So you've got a good opportunity to get some face time, with the preface "I've been thinking about what you said recently about my communication skills being inadequate.  I'd love to try and improve my skills, and I'd like some guidance from you on doing so.  Would we be able to have a 30 minute (or whatever) chat about that?"

In that meeting, you need to drill down into two things: what your boss considers "adequate communication", and why he thinks he needs that level of communication.  The former is so that you can actually meet your boss' expectations (which is your responsibility as a professional, regardless), and the latter is so you can understand his "commander's intent" and make judgment calls on situations that weren't covered by his specific guidance -- that's what takes you from "acceptable performance" to "top performer" -- doing what you boss wants *without* being told.

There's also a useful side benefit to the "why" question -- you can tell much better if your boss *is* a complete fruit-loop who you need to run away from.  (It's not as common as you think, but it does happen).  If his reasons for wanting all this communication are complete nonsense, then you can make that determination from a position of information, and you can better assess future employment opportunities with an eye to avoiding ending up in the same situation.

STEVENM's picture

1. Is this micro communications normal?

At some places... or rather, with some managers.  I've seen it, and I've seen the opposite.  But hey, at the end of the day your job is to deliver what your boss needs.  If at this place it's overcommunication, go for it.  It seems like you don't think it will be hard to do.  Just odd.  Probably is a little odd in some ways, but if odd works for him or her then who are we to judge? 

You've been given an easy home run.  You'll look good for doing the communication, but you'll also look good for changing it quick and effectively, and it can be as simple as an automated reminder popping up on the work PC every so often to check in and update your boss.

2. How is communications done in your team? & 3. What is communicated, how often?

That will vary by individual within the team, the day, the issue, and more for me.  There are days when I overcommunicate like crazy because I know that it's desired for what I'm working on.  There are days I barely leave the desk, because I know my boss considers "in the loop" on this activity as having put it in my hands.  They're happy to be able to consider it "No longer in the inbox" now that it's assigned to my plate.  It can be as frequent as checkpoints at 30 minute intervals, or as infrequent as "Hey, we just finished that thing you started us on last week."  When in doubt I'll just ask what's most desireable.