As per the annual Gallup State of the Global Workplace: Report, employees have reported continued dissatisfaction and disengagement in the workplace. These issues likely contribute to trends like the “great resignation” and the rise of “quiet quitting.” While numerous factors shape a strong or weak employer brand, effective two-way communication remains a crucial yet frequently neglected aspect of the overall strategy.
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Two-way communication is crucial in enhancing company culture for many obvious reasons:
Two-way communication comes in many forms. Let’s discuss some of the best ones here:
By implementing a strong two-way communication flow, your employees can break down walls between departments and make it easier to get information and collaborate. Here are some top reasons as to why you should implement two-way communication in your workplace:
By promoting open lines of communication, two-way interactions break down silos and encourage collaboration across teams. Employees are more likely to share ideas and work together on projects that will contribute to the organization’s growth and success.
Employee communication tools can help drive employee engagement by ensuring employees receive the required information and can provide feedback. When team members feel connected to the company and each other through effective communication, they become more productive and engaged in their daily responsibilities.
Clear communication reduces ambiguity regarding roles, responsibilities and expectations. By fostering two-way communication, you can minimize misunderstandings, streamline workflows, and ultimately enhance productivity to avoid unnecessary confusion.
When a content workforce feels heard and respected, this leads to higher morale and a greater sense of purpose within the organization. This satisfaction often translates into improved retention rates, as employees are less likely to seek opportunities elsewhere when they feel valued.
Regular feedback loops enable organizations to learn, adapt and improve processes based on employee input. Regular check-ins, employee pulse surveys, and informal discussions allow leaders to gather insights from employees, leading to actionable changes that enhance the workplace experience.
With the rise of remote and deskless workers, real-time communication is crucial. Using platforms that support real-time updates keeps employees informed about changes and important announcements as they happen, eliminating the need for regular check-ins or status updates.
Recognizing the benefits of two-way communication is vital. However, you might be wondering ‘how to implement the best communication strategy in your workplace?’
Well, here are a few two-way communication strategies that you can easily incorporate into your internal messaging.
Choosing the right tools to simplify communication is essential. Take some time to explore communication software such as instant messaging applications, video conferencing tools, voice over internet protocol (VoIP) solutions, or even a robust intranet and employee experience platform to ensure a smooth two-way communication flow. Once you see what works well, bolster your existing internal communication channels or introduce new tools that fit your needs.
A centralized communication platform brings clarity and keeps everyone on the same page. With employee communication apps, all team members— including field sales reps—can easily access shared information and the intranet. This boosts collaboration, fosters connection, and ultimately enhances productivity across the organization. Therefore, on-the-go access to the intranet keeps employees across all layers of the organization informed and aligned.
In any organization, employee feedback is the backbone of a productive workplace and understanding how it works is important for individual contributors and senior leadership. Implement a two-way communication system to encourage open dialogue, allowing employees to share their insights and concerns freely. It involves active listening and responding, ensuring that communication flows in both directions.
Employees wear multiple hats and fill in many roles. With that comes a natural expectation of being recognized and rewarded within the organization. According to a Gallup survey, only one in three workers in the U.S. strongly agree that they received recognition or praise for doing good work. This statistic highlights a significant communication gap. Therefore, creating a robust recognition program—whether through peer-to-peer acknowledgments, manager shout-outs, or formal awards—can make all the difference.
Read our ebook, next-gen employee recognition: the modern talent retention playbook to get actionable insights.
Transparency goes hand in hand with empathy. Being open about decisions, challenges, and changes within the organization builds trust and fosters a culture of honesty. When employees feel they’re in the loop and understand the “why” behind actions, it can alleviate uncertainty and anxiety. In fact, according to the Harvard Business Review, employees in high-trust workplaces are 76% more engaged and 29% more satisfied with their lives.
It is clear that leadership engagement is critical for fostering a culture of two-way communication in the workplace. When employees see leaders actively engaged with their feedback, they are more motivated to collaborate toward shared business goals. Therefore, one great way to enhance leadership engagement is through focus groups or training sessions. However, finding the time for this crucial work can be a challenge as well. Check out our free guide – Take the leadership engagement challenge to make it easy.
Here are some examples to illustrate how you can implement two-way communication in your workplace:
You can quickly create and deliver compelling newsletters with personalized content to drive strong engagement with every send. Create consistent, beautiful newsletters that support videos, links, buttons, and images without bogging down by design or list management. Read our case study: Sammons Enterprises observed 600,000+ content reviews with Simpplr’s personalized employee newsletter.
Gain deep insights into employee emotions, confidence and sentiments using an AI-powered employee pulse survey. Having an advanced intranet with robust AI analytics that allows short surveys with a yes/no can be categorized into shareable reports. This streamlines data collection and frees up bandwidth for more strategic initiatives.
Virtual town hall meetings are live-streamed events that bring employees and leaders together in real time. These sessions allow the leadership team to share important updates while allowing employees to ask questions directly, fostering a sense of connection and engagement. Consider incorporating Q&A sessions and live polls during the event to enhance this interaction.
Daily huddles provide a dedicated time for managers and their team members to share updates, address roadblocks, and celebrate successes. This type of communication style reduces misunderstandings and ensures everyone is informed about ongoing projects and priorities, minimizing reliance on informal channels like emails or chats.
As organizations and economies face increasingly frequent shifts, sharing information at the right time, in the right way, becomes cardinal. Several key factors — including staffing, budget allocation, channel dynamics and modern communication tools — influence the effectiveness of communications.
Therefore, one of the most effective solutions to transform two-way communication is to implement a modern intranet platform like Simpplr. With Simpplr’s AI-powered employee experience platform, you can control and manage cross-channel messaging via SMS, desktop, mobile, newsletters, displays and beyond. And the ability to track analytics across multiple channels and devices with in-app analytics streamlines the process of monitoring and optimizing a leadership comms strategy.
With Simpplr’s multi-channel communication capabilities, you can:
Communication is at the core of every human function. Without it, workers can’t know what’s expected of them, how to achieve their goals, or where to find support. A crucial part of effective communication is reciprocity — when communication becomes a two-way street, it allows each individual to participate freely and meaningfully.
“Nobody likes working at a company that doesn't take their viewpoint into account, that doesn't recognise the value of their voice,” said Julia Markish, director of advisory services at Lattice. “The act of asking, listening, and acting on employee voices will naturally help have an engaged workforce.”
Building a two-way communication strategy can leverage the otherwise untapped insights of employees, and help them feel more connected to each other, to leaders and to the company as a whole.
Two-way communication is an intentional style of interaction between two or more parties, where all participants are encouraged to share information and ideas, and especially to listen to what each other has contributed.
“There is always the risk of your message not landing with your audience,” Markish said. “Unless you engage in active listening back, you'll never actually know whether the message that landed was the message that you intended.”
Why it matters: Expecting and receiving timely communication builds trust, accountability, and respect among employees and managers. Two-way communication helps employees know they can count on meaningful responses, their ideas are being taken seriously, and they’re genuinely part of the team — instead of a cog in the corporate machine.
Two-way communication is critical to the success of each and every business strategy, and largely benefits employees at all levels.
Ultimately, two-way communication creates an environment where employees feel confident to bring ideas to the table, ask questions, and identify areas for improvement without fear of retribution.
Organisational cultures built on reciprocity and engagement are more likely to retain employees, because they’ll build a sense of purpose and belonging when connecting with colleagues. Some companies take things even further by making self-peer-manager feedback as part of their approach to performance. Even if your company isn't ready for that, two-way communication at the cultural level is still a must.
Contact us to discuss your requirements of two-way communication service. Our experienced sales team can help you identify the options that best suit your needs.
Employees should have equal and direct access to communicating with each other synchronously and asynchronously. While some employees might have an easy time sharing their ideas and opinions in a public forum, other introverted workers might not have the same confidence.
“Engagement surveys are going to be your best bet,” Markish said. But to work effectively, surveys should function as part of your larger communication approach, not a standalone tactic, she added.“If your only vehicle for soliciting concerns from employees is five minutes at the end of an All-Hands where you read through a sanitised list of questions, then that's not two-way communication. That's performative. Look around at your systems and processes to identify whether they all have a component of that two way communication.”
Inter-office communication — like instant messaging or employee feedback tools that let workers and managers share feedback easily — make it easier to share information in hybrid workplaces where employees have to communicate remotely or across time zones. The simpler it is for employees to share their opinions, the more often they’ll let their thoughts be known.
When individual contributors see that leaders have bought into and spent time engaging with feedback from employees, they may feel more inclined to participate than if the guidance came solely from Human Resources management. Markish emphasised that HR teams need support and alignment from executives to make two-way communication an ingrained part of company culture.
“HR teams need to take the role of loudspeaker, not content creator,” Markish said. “Communication expectations are operational. They need to be coming directly from leaders or chiefs of staff.”
One way to bring leaders into the fold is through focus groups or training sessions. Training leaders to model and endorse the values of two-way communication will help employees across the organisation see it, value it, and understand how to implement it themselves.
Recurring meetings, forgotten agendas, and missing stakeholders create a recipe for hybrid disaster. When employees have to attend meetings just for the sake of it, they become disengaged and resentful of collaboration.
Sustainable manufacturing company Trane Technologies found a way to reduce meaningless meetings with a strategy of cutting right to the chase. They implemented check-ins called “What Matters Most?” between managers and employees, which involved “having one on one conversations, really getting to know your team, and understanding what they value,” said Teodora Vassileva, a regional learning and development leader at the company.
Vassileva’s team created an automated survey where employees identify three things that matter most, and send responses to their manager. Managers are then required to meet with the employee within 30 days to discuss employees’ responses.
“When managers see the [employee’s response], they might assume ‘she really wants work life balance — she must not be getting it’,” Vassileva explained. “But really she means that it's great. Like, ‘I get to work from home and you allow me to do that. That's very, very important to me right now’.”
Following a survey with a meeting for listening is just one example of effectively closing the loop. Managers can also support effective communication by using one-to-ones to review feedback instead of running through tasks, or encouraging employees to meet with colleagues on other teams.
Feeling overworked and underappreciated was the leading pain point when we surveyed UK employees in — 44% of them said it was the top reason they considered switching jobs. But in that same survey, only 19% of HR leaders thought it was a reason employees were quitting. This disconnect between both groups could be more deeply understood with effective communication.
“Uplifting our people, culture, and communities” is one of the values that drives Vassileva’s team. “Absolutely everything we do is tied to that,” she added, and encouraged People teams and managers to think about what that looks like at a macro and micro level.
HR teams, executives, and managers can all pitch in for employee recognition. Make positive feedback celebratory by publicly sharing wins during meetings, on instant messaging, or through department-wide emails. Offering praise regularly helps employees know they’re doing a good job individually, and that they’re on the right track to make an impact for the team.
In hybrid environments, it’s crucial to ensure remote employees have the same access to meetings and collaboration as everyone else. That means making video or conferencing available to every meeting attendee, regardless of their location, so they can participate in group conversations synchronously.
For meetings delivered over video or audio, enabling captions, transcripts and recordings can help employees see, hear and process the communication in the way that is most accessible to their needs, and be able to reference information later if they’re unable to take notes.
For companies returning to in-person workplaces, leaders should think about the design of the physical spaces so employees can interact and connect with each other easily, while still having space and time to focus on their work.
Keeping office doors open or having virtual office hours held regularly makes leaders more accessible to individuals who want direct access to share their thoughts and ideas.
Support employee development with the resources you already have by pairing new and seasoned employees together to foster mentorships within the workplace. When employees are encouraged to connect with colleagues outside of their functional teams, they share institutional knowledge they might never have accessed otherwise.
HR teams can provide guidance for mentors and mentees to contribute to the relationship, such as setting a cadence for meetings and structuring feedback to promote exchange of ideas.
Employees can use what they learn from each other to work on their professional growth and solve departmental challenges, both of which benefit development, performance and learning across the organisation. Managers can even have employees include insights from their mentors in developmental reviews or conversations about career tracks.
Employees spend the first few weeks of a new role trying to absorb a fountain of company information, yet it can feel more like trying to drink water from a firehose. Clearly explaining communication norms from the onset of their employee experience can help workers understand what to expect from their new company culture.
“The way we communicate has to be born of your operating rhythm, style, and team,” Markish said. “It probably will fall flat otherwise.”
If your company has specific communication norms — such as a day of the reserved for no meetings, or a time frame for expecting responses to instant messages — make it clear that everyone is expected to observe them. Don’t forget to document your norms in a central, accessible place that employees can regularly reference, such as a company-wide intranet or your HRIS.
When employees feel connected to the rest of their team, they’ll be more comfortable sharing their ideas candidly. Having dedicated time for building relationships at work can help employees become more connected to, accountable to, and supportive of each other.
Scheduling events once a quarter (or even more frequently) will give employees a chance to mingle with colleagues in a more casual setting.
Team-building doesn’t have to be team-specific, though. Especially in remote environments, not everyone regularly interacts with individuals who work in different departments. Regularly making time for lunch, coffee chats, or other short meetings can improve cross-functional collaboration, connectivity, and feedback.
When tracking employee satisfaction and experience through engagement surveys, Vassileva said signs of disengagement can be found in the volume of responses — not just the contents of responses themselves.
“When we don't get a lot of feedback or reception, that's a very big indicator that engagement isn't happening,” she said.
If participation or adoption rates fall unexpectedly, that’s a form of communication in itself. Taking time to speak with employees — such as the “What Matters Most?” conversations or focus groups — can help managers keep a pulse on why employees attitudes are changing. Perhaps they don’t have time to participate in engagement surveys, which is an indicator of being overworked. Or they don’t believe the survey results will lead to productive changes, which means they’re sceptical of HR and leadership. Either way, it’s worth finding out what’s underneath the lack of responses.
Make sure the efforts put in to employee feedback and recognition are aligned with the way employees want to be praised — otherwise, recognition programs become a misguided effort.
In a survey of workers by Blackhawk Network, 75% of respondents whose employers deliver recognition and rewards programmes said they don’t actually recognise people the way they’d prefer. Over half of respondents wanted to be publicly recognised alongside colleagues, while 48% wanted to be privately recognised by their manager. Ultimately, 83% of respondents said receiving recognition would increase their productivity and loyalty to their company.
It’s easy to look at other companies making headlines for innovative people strategies, but external benchmarking can be distracting and irrelevant to what your company can reasonably and effectively achieve. Conducting a survey about current communication norms and needs is the perfect place to start.
“You can gather inspiration externally, but the people that you are accountable to are your employees, not anybody outside of the organisation,” Markish said. “If you're able to hold up a mirror and really get specific, that can help your company get aligned on a lot of processes.”
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