Communicate authentically, like you.
How can you communicate a message authentically when it doesn't feel like your message? If it doesn’t come naturally, it is often because it doesn’t feel like you.
“Please cascade to your teams.”
In medium and large organisations, well any organisation, senior leadership depend on the power of the ‘cascade’ to make sure their decisions are operationalised and messages reach the working level.
The most senior leaders make the decisions and often take the time to have conversations with the next level of leaders who are tasked with communicating the message. Ultimately what ends up happening is that some levels in the organisation will receive an email that says; ‘please cascade’
That is where there is potential for things to go wrong. Why?
Because an email is about as far away as you can get from a two way conversation.
A presentation of a centrally produced slide deck is not personal.
Scripts are not your own way of telling the story.
The cascade is often the flow of messages from the top to the bottom, whereas a conversation is an exchange. The exchange is how you can make a real difference in what people feel and do. It requires listening and questioning in both directions. Not every decision and message needs a conversation, but think about the biggest changes, the radically different direction and the new ways of working. A cascade without conversation will not work to make sustainable change.
For the senior leaders who send out the message or made the decision, this might feel like going backwards. For mid-level leaders, those deeper conversations are essential to equip them to communicate authentically.
It is the difference between a message that is a forwarded email with ‘FYI’ in the body of the message. Or the leader who says, ‘This is the global message from HQ’ or worse “I am sharing this because my boss asked me to.” The struggle comes when the message does not resonate.
I believe there are two main reasons why leader struggle to share authentically; either they don’t understand the message or they don’t believe in the message.
For both situations the solution is the same, go back and have conversations, with your line, and their line until you get the clarity, understanding and positive regard for the message you are being asked to convey. And now the challenge for senior leaders is to slow down, take time to listen and respond.
