by Katie Mead

   This article was originally published in The Productivity Institute (PI) Newsletter

Communication, even with great content, is nothing without trust.

Elusive and essential, whether personal or professional, trust is an intrinsic part of every successful relationship.  But in our modern age of de-personalization and lightning-quick information transfers, how do you ensure that the necessary trust is developed?

More than words
Effective communication is also an essential tool for relationship development; from a supervisor to her employees or a business owner to his clients, what you say and how you say it has a crucial impact on the ways you build trust.  In our climate of ever expanding social media options, there are countless ways to reach out to our audience; how do we ensure that we really connect?  Every relationship is unique, but here are some commonalities shared by great communicators:

Despite the adage ‘no news is good news’, make sure that you do the opposite. 
There’s nothing worse than being left hanging – as an employee, a client, or a prospective contractor.  Whether or not you’re the key decision-maker, and even if you don’t have much new information to impart, use all available channels to update your audience.  Thanks to applications like Twitter, Facebook, and endless instant messaging options (not to mention the good, old-fashioned phone), it’s amazingly easy to stay in touch.  A quick note apprising someone of the situation will put them at ease and help them trust you – as well as convince them that you will indeed be in touch as soon as you’ve got real news. 

When getting the point across, make sure to tell the whole story. 
Lots of would-be communicators do a good job of relaying the facts, but that’s not enough; they don’t connect the dots.  Giving someone the whole story and telling them how the facts inter-relate is important. If you assume that the information is obvious you risk erroneous interpretations and misunderstandings.   Understanding the ‘why’ will strengthen commitment levels too: people are more invested in their actions when they know why they’re doing them.

Remember that your role as a good communicator includes helping others make good decisions.  To do this it’s essential that you’re truthful – have the courage to tell the truth and expect honesty in return.  That’s not to say that you must divulge every piece of information, but telling someone that you’re uncomfortable saying more engenders more trust than dissembling or telling a half-truth.  It’s only when we’re given all the facts that we can make informed decisions.   An effective communication strategy is one that enables good decisions – your audience will thank you for this, and it will go a long way toward building solid relationships.

You must be accountable for your own message. 
Don’t pass the buck or absolve yourself of responsibility even when the message you’ve got to pass on is a hard one to give.  Don’t hide behind the guise of messenger – email certainly has its place, but a difficult message is better received in person or on the phone.  Choose your words carefully, but remember that people respond to authenticity and this coupled with respect and compassion will go a long way to developing solid relationships, even in tough times.

Above all, building trust takes time. 
Effective communication is an ongoing and continuous process that evolves and develops alongside your message.  Words mean a lot, but when they’re paired with consistent action you’ve got a truly powerful message.  If they are trust-based, great communication skills will continue to work for you as you build morale, boost a profile or grow your business through the referrals of satisfied customers.

The bottom line
Great communicators know the value and power of trust as essential element of effective communication.  Whether your medium is verbal or textual, developing solid trust-based relationships will make your audience sit up and listen.

Katie Mead is the co-founder of Springboard Consulting, Katie is a passionate about good communication.  From a diverse background in the fine arts, she has developed a proven track record of success working in both the for-profit and non-profit sectors. Her particular areas of expertise include marketing, grant writing, non-profit resource building and management, fundraising, and the design and launch of various keynote projects and events.  Katie serves as a founding member of RECREATURA_Arts & Culture, an international arts organization.  Read more from Katie on her blog site: A Love of Art.

by Melanie DePaoli

   This article was originally published in The Productivity Institute (PI) Newsletter

Every company’s target market is comprised of “busy people.” Busy people are very valuable, but they are busy for a reason – they have their own life, their own challenges and every company wants to connect with them. Have you considered how these busy people perceive the way you are trying to communicate with them? The fact is, you need to accept up front that busy people will only give you their attention if they see value in it. The mere fact that you have targeted them is not a good enough reason.

People are overwhelmed with hundreds of thousands of different communications every day – email, text messaging, online ads, phone calls, television commercials, point of purchase displays, and the list goes on and on. They do not have the capacity to treat every communication experience as equally important, nor do they want to! Just because you think your product, service or message is important and that this busy person needs to hear what you are saying does not mean they will feel that way.

Busy people pride themselves on being unique – not fitting into this category or that. But instead creating the categories they want to be a part of. They look for products and services offered by companies they are able to trust to feed this desire. By learning to be the company that busy people trust to consistently help them feel this way, you have the potential to become the company that sets the standards instead of one of the ones striving to achieve the standards set by others.

Trust is what keeps a business alive and allows it to run smoothly. With trust, businesses thrive. Without it, businesses suffer and corruption takes over. It takes time to build trust with a busy person. There is a good chance your communications will be blown off just because it is their unconscious habit. Another possibility is that you may be using the wrong medium for the message you are trying to convey, but that is a whole other article.

Busy people would rather experience life than listen to what you have to say. They want to enjoy the things they do and the people in their life, so timing plays an important role in how and when you communicate with them. People typically do not like being lied to or treated like they are just another transaction so authenticity is the best approach.

The Authenticity Approach is the best way to connect with busy people and to run your business. Good or bad, the truth always comes out. Being authentic will allow busy people to relate to your company which builds trust. When they trust you, they want work with you.

Mel DePaoli is the president and founder of Omicle located in Seattle, WA. She helps companies create a contagious culture by connecting the way the business is operated with how the business is marketed. Please visit Omicle for more information about how Omicle can become your Catalyst for Discovery. She is also interviewing companies for her upcoming book series, Brand or Culture: Which Comes First. Please visit Brand or Culture.com to get involved in the Brand or Culture Debate today! You may follow her on Twitter @MelDePaoli or become a fan of Omicle on Facebook.

by Frank Grillo

   This article was originally published in The Productivity Institute (PI) Newsletter

While the hyped-up impact of the misnamed Swine Flu pandemic turned out to be grossly exaggerated, the scenario provided a long-overdue reason for enterprises to ask, “What if it had been the real thing?” One need only look south to Mexico City to see in glaring reality the impact of a locked-down city and the effects on day-to-day communications and commerce. And though 2005 is a “distant past” at this point, if anyone finds Mexico City’s situation disturbing, it still pales in comparison to the tragedy of post-Katrina New Orleans.

Certainly those along the south Atlantic and Gulf Coasts of the U.S. have taken business continuity planning more seriously since the days of Katrina, and many large Northeast institutions have done likewise since the horrors of 9/11. But generally speaking, the majority of small-to-medium sized enterprises (SMEs) have let their business continuity planning languish, especially around their communications infrastructure. And it’s easy to understand why. If a business doesn’t face a potential catastrophe on a regular basis (like those in hurricane- and wildfire-prone regions), the likelihood of an enterprise-threatening event is fairly minimal, while the costs of preparing for one can be quite high.

But that’s one benefit that actually came from the pig flu scare: it’s brought to everyone’s attention just how costly a pandemic or other enterprise-disabling event would be. Given the span of places where the flu presented itself in relatively quick time span, it’s not too hard to imagine a lockdown in Anytown, USA.

Because SMEs typically have limited resources in time, personnel, and capital, they are the most vulnerable to experience losses due to lack of preparation, which is disturbing considering the following:
• What may be considered a nuisance for a larger company can spell disaster for a SME; business interruptions can be as large as a hurricane or as small as a power outage.
• If a business is inextricably tied to a brick-and-mortar building, any event that keeps employees from entering the building can spell disaster.
• The majority of SMEs who experience an interruption lasting 10 days or more never fully recover, and most close within two years.

While most small enterprises’ recovery plans include data backup, there is one important aspect of planning that is often overlooked: how employees and customers will continue communicating if a disruption occurs at the company’s premises. For most SMEs replicating a PBX at a second location and creating a failover procedure is just economically unfeasible. Nevertheless, ensuring communications in the event of a disruption is critical to the success of any company, and a robust hosted unified communications solution can offer unmatched continuity and disaster recovery capabilities.

Hosted communications can be implemented easily and with no capital expense on the part of the SME, no need to hire additional IT staff and no worries of technological obsolescence. And hosted unified communications offers a range of functionality that can replicate the conveniences of being in an office—allowing business to continue operating as usual—for any length of time.

Some CIOs look at hosted unified communications strictly as a business continuity solution, to provide recovery for specific parts of the enterprise that would be mission critical. Other CIOs are energized about hosted communications not only for the continuity it brings to the table, but also for the mobility and remote office support, the collaboration for their users and the savings in its no CapEx model.

With today’s hosted communications technology, every enterprise in the U.S. can operate “virtually” with employees scattered away from corporate offices, yet operating as if they were sitting side-by-side. To the outside world, the geographic distribution of the employees is transparent. Beyond the great flexibility this operational model provides, it enables SMEs to not just survive, but to continue thriving in the face of significant disaster, with little or no down time. Now that’s a very real competitive edge, and in today’s economic times, a necessity. Business executives owe it to themselves, their investors and their employees to take a close look at making their business truly survivable, no matter what happens at the physical location. 

Frank Grillo is a visionary communications executive known for his ability to identify growth opportunities and to produce extraordinary results that make a real contribution to an organization’s bottom line. Serving as executive vice president of marketing at Cypress Communications®, Frank Grillo is responsible for product management, pricing, marketing, advertising, and sales support of the company’s products, including Cypress’ award-winning hosted unified communications solution, C4 IP™. To learn more about hosted unified communications and Cypress’ C4 IP solution, go to www.cypresscom.net.

by Bruce Newman

   This article was originally published in The Productivity Institute (PI) Newsletter

It has almost always been the accepted norm that the most important characteristic when hiring consultants was their knowledge. This was certainly true in the 1970’s through early 2000 when the key characteristic of most candidates was their knowledge and experience.  Other aspects of a candidate were often deemed secondary.

In a recent survey by The Productivity Institute, respondents were asked to select the three characteristics they deemed most important when hiring a consultant. Surprisingly, the most important deciding characteristic that over 53% of the respondents selected was excellent communication skills, surpassing such traditionally predictable areas as honesty and technical knowledge.  Other characteristics in the PI survey included: professionalism, knowledge, integrity, availability, reliability and several others.  Yet, communication skills easily outdistanced them.  This is very significant. 

Selecting and hiring a consultant is not an easy process or decision; yet, it is crucial for companies to make wise choices, particularly when a consultant can have a direct impact on a company’s productivity.  It is for this reason that The Productivity Institute, LLC, assists organizations in locating and retaining outstanding consultants whose skills and results are excellent.

The ability to work with others was the second most important consulting characteristic, having been selected by 45% of the respondents.  The ability to work with others and good communication skills go hand in hand and allows consultants to fully understand a project’s scope and goals while keeping all project stakeholders appraised of the project’s progress.

These two characteristics surpassed the third most important consulting characteristic: experience. Apparently, in this challenging economy, interpersonal and social skills have become every bit as important (if not more so) than technical skills and experience.  Companies have become aware that successful consulting also requires excellent communications.  Just possessing the appropriate knowledge and experience is no longer adequate. This is quite a departure from the 80’s and early 90’s where the importance of social and interpersonal skills were usually minimized in the selection of consultants.

One common aspect of good project management is the ability of all key parties to regularly and effectively communicate with each other. In many cases, it is the critical factor in determining the success or failure of a project.  It is revealing by this survey that this level of importance has been extended to the hiring of consultants.  

In this frightening economy, where consultants are playing a more important and visible role than ever before, the Human Factors have become a more important decision criterion than they ever had been before. The consultants most in demand are those who are skilled listeners, speakers and team players. For businesses to survive and to thrive in this oppressive economic environment, they are looking for consultants who can play more of a coordinating and leadership role. Consultants have become much more than ‘brains for hire’.

Bruce Newman is the Vice President at The Productivity Institute, LLC, an acknowledged leader in the areas of selecting consultants and improving productivity. He is also the editor of the Productivity Institute Newsletter, a free content-is-king newsletter (circ. 5,400+) and a thought leader.  Follow him on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and the Productivity Institute blog.

by Bruce Newman
 
The current economic crisis has affected the hiring and use of consultants.  Many companies erroneously view consultants as a needless expense.  This short-sightedness overlooks many of the benefits consultants can provide.  First, consultants usually have a contract for a specific period of time or per job.  Unlike employees, they don’t require the (up to) 30% overhead* for benefits, social security, etc. that companies face with each employee.  Second, they provide rapid expertise and insight in area companies may need to quickly address.  This in turn, enables companies to pivot quickly while adjusting to rapidly changing marketplace and economic realities. 

Many people who agree with this philosophy also point out that long-term employees have the industry and company knowledge that can only be learned through years of experience.  While this is true, having expert outstanding consultants who can provide additional expertise and out-of-the-box thinking could greatly augment productivity.  Such increases would be particularly noteworthy with the support of senior management and through outstanding communications and training.

Bruce Newman is the Vice President at The Productivity Institute which specializes in matching the consulting needs of companies to the expertise of rated outstanding consultants.  With over 25 years of business and consulting experience, Bruce is an expert on consultants and productivity.

* You May Earn 30% More Than You Think, by Siri Anderson, PayScale.com, Yahoo, 3/2/09.