While the planet is still reeling from the pandemic…business finds a way. Even wearing masks and social distancing, we have to find a way to collaborate with one another. Corporate and commercial communication is crucial, now more than ever, as companies coordinate healthcare and critical supplies. Part of this coordination involves file sharing. In fact, a large part does. Mixed with constructive conversation, it can be the heart of teamwork, negotiation, and productivity. During COVID-19, we need to use these restrictions to strengthen our methods and skills of coordination instead of letting them atrophy. We can kick old habits that our offices have developed over decades of miscommunication, and over decades of age differences as well. If you want to work with your employees effectively, you have open the lines of file sharing and communication.

Pick Up the Phone Once in a While

We’re more connected than ever now, and our phone lines are connected to our hips! Don’t just text or message your employees – call them! Even if you work in the same building. Phone calls often get you a faster answer, even if that answer is “I’m not there to pick up your call.” I get it. You don’t like confrontation. You’re better with your words when you can write them down. You’ve got a cold. Fine, make excuses. But phone calls will help open up lines of communication in your office and normalize regular conversation over projects. And if you’re in the same building as your staff and comfortable calling them, the obvious next step is to drop in for a visit. Speak in-person. Even wearing masks and maintaining a proper distance, you’d be surprised how candid conversation can make people more comfortable than digital outreach.

Share Document Access

We just finished talking about using your voices to communicate, and now we’re going to focus on written information. Go figure. We promise we’re not being hypocritical! A well-oiled office writes stuff down. All of those documents have to go somewhere – a place your employees can access them, a place that’s secure. There’s software for data like that. Software that can manage it so that your whole team can get a hold of it. These programs are called “Enterprise Content Management,” or more recently “Content Services.” The best Content Services are versatile and open-ended, with a robust feature set. They allow your administrative team to create workflows, giving files a path on which team members can submit, edit, take notes on, or approve them.

Companies will use messaging services to connect their employees, but without a way to share and process documents together, huge chunks of the conversation are missing from the record. File Sharing Services like Contentverse provide an audit trail for all documents, ensuring that you can track the what, who, where, and when at every stage of a file’s life cycle. With options for hosting at your location or in the cloud, using the web portal or the mobile app, and launching in environments with different types of user licenses and workstations, an ECM like this keeps communication open despite the traditional wrench in your workflow.

Reach Out, but Don’t Zone Out

As much as we love to hear ourselves talk, listening to our employees and colleagues is just as productive. This is what we were discussing earlier – the single conductor telling all the musicians how to play or all the dancers how to dance. Well, it may be that a manager is orchestrating the operation, but without the employees, there would be no operation. You need to listen to what your team members say. Read through their reports in-depth and make sure you understand them before responding. You need to ask questions, listen to the answers, and then come up with an informed game plan.

Every manager, owner, director, or executive likes to think that they have all the answers and all of the best ideas. That’s simply never been the case. A company is made up of people. If you didn’t need other folks in other departments handling things, then you would be running the whole organization on your own. When your employees report to you, don’t interrupt them. Wait for them to complete their thoughts or finish reading aloud. Don’t respond immediately. Digest what they’ve told you. Make sure that you have understood all of it. How does it apply to your current model or project plan? Does it conflict with your line of thinking? Perhaps it is the correct option where your idea is in fact wrong. Once you’ve allowed their thoughts to have a pregnant pause of contemplation, answer slowly and effectively. Be careful with your response. Be deliberate. Only by listening properly can you speak intelligently.

Keep Information Clear and Communication Open

The biggest culprit for a delayed or derailed project is miscommunication. Most of that miscommunication comes from the top down. A director or manager gave an assignment, but they were vague or inconsistent about the goal. What information do you want this project to reveal? What ends should this project achieve? If that key information is not clear from your memo, you have already failed to be a precise and direct leader.

You shouldn’t feel the need to micromanage every step of every task your employees are given. That would defeat the purpose of a hierarchy of responsibility. However, it’s important to direct everyone and lay out what you need from your employees. You must be clear. You must be thorough. And you must be available for questions (remember what we said about listening). None of these qualities demand micromanagement. And mastering them will ensure that a team member with a good head on their shoulders can take your prompt and run with it. A management professional who lacks these qualities is the one who will find themselves micromanaging more often than not. And that’s not a good thing.

Consider, Answer, Elaborate

If you don’t have time to give a longer response, at least say in a sentence or two why a result doesn’t work for you, or what in this successful project you would like to see more of. Without guiding feedback, employees have no idea what they’re doing right and wrong. They will keep taking shots in the dark until one blindly strikes the target. Don’t be a closed book. Open your door. Answer questions. Let your employees know why you’ve said yes or no. What’s more, with open and easy file sharing, your subordinates and colleagues will have access to the resources necessary to self-diagnose.

Constructive Criticism

Give your employees a civil, level response. As a leader, even in an office setting, you have to develop thick skin. Not everything you throw at the wall will stick. Get used to it. And get used to the back and forth of workplace conversation and office file sharing. The better you communicate with your team, the better you will communicate with everyone else.