As the impacts of the global coronavirus outbreak continue to change our lives, people across the globe are adopting new ways of working to help authorities stem the worldwide spread of COVID-19.
New ways of working create new challenges as well as new opportunities and collaborations. Organisations will find that ‘not’ having a communication strategy will impact their employee’s productivity and reduce their engagement.
Lack of direct communication with your most essential assets will make them feel isolated, disengaged and ‘out of the loop’ from decision-makers. Effective communication is critical as companies adjust to navigating this global issue. Common questions people ask when going through significant operational changes:
- How quickly can we notify our workforce of the change?
- How do we inform multiple individuals and stakeholders about this?
- How do we know if crucial messages have been received and actioned?
- How can we reduce the rumours and misinformation that may cause further disruption?
‘You’ve got Mail’
Many organisations will solely rely on mass emails to share critical communications.
Although it’s a widely adopted tool and a universal platform, it has limitations:
- Emails are often delivered to a junk or other folders where the recipients may miss them
- Information can be lost amongst all other incoming messages
- The onus is on the recipient to assess the relevance of the email
- Emailing multiple people can be cumbersome and slow
- Recipients can choose to ignore communications regardless of the importance
- Not knowing if your message has been read or understood
- Monitoring various responses can be difficult
Multi-Channel Communication
Mass notification systems that have the capability to share information through multiple channels are a necessity for organisations going through change.
Systems that allow you to send several communications via different means at the same time, help ensure no one is left in the dark. Instantly sharing operational changes, safe working advice or important safety alerts at a push of a button.
What are the benefits?
- Utilise multiple channels to deliver your messages
- Provide clear and consistent messaging from one central place
- Instantly share up-to-date advice or change in procedures or essential operational updates
- Deliver messages to 1 or 10000 recipients immediately
- Use geographical locations to send messages to specific individuals or groups
- Schedule regular and automatic communications
- Share media, documents and policies
- Invite users to the official company collaboration channels such as Slack, Trello or Asana.
Respond With Confidence
Mass notification platforms allow employees to respond to specific questions or report issues directly to their senior management. This will enable companies to make decisions based on actual responses and real-time data.
Robust systems will let you know if messages have been delivered, confirm if the recipients have read and acknowledged the message. Giving senior management the confidence that their workforce is fully informed, and if required, they have the flexibility to send follow up communications automatically through pre-defined or instant individual messages.
While the global impact of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is still unclear, organisations can try to control the impacts on its employees and operations by adopting new ways of communicating. More importantly, it will be crucial to keep your people in the loop, informed of relevant information and critical developments. It’s essential to provide your workforce with the means to respond and report problems directly, allowing you to make informed and faster decisions when needed.