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Communication
Communication is one of the most important factors in achieving group success. The International Association of Business Communicators (www.iabc.com ) is an organization dedicated to understanding the challenges associated with communication. In a recent study involving 472 companies, the IABC found 4 key communication challenges that all companies face:
- Encouraging staff to internalize the business strategy thereby connecting employees at all levels with the organizational strategy.
- Effective communication between leadership and management and their employees.
- Breaking down communication barriers and managing information overload.
- Understanding and measuring the quality and importance of internal communication and how it affects business results.
Don’t Try to Communicate...Communicate!
As humans, we often make problems more complicated than they really are. We ask ourselves questions and break down every problem to its components in such a way that it can be difficult to glean a solution. The most successful corporations are those that build great teams and create an environment where individual contributions are appreciated and respected while reinforcing the important message of the collective. Moreover, the experience of group success in successful corporations is one that makes each member of the team feel as though they’re at least partially responsible for that success. Communication is integral but should be a seamless aspect of this process.4 Steps to a Great Communication Event
1. Prepare your Audience for Fun and the Chance to Let Loose
Anybody who has shown any level of success in a business environment is fundamentally a good communicator. We can all speak and listen, read and write but whenever you get a large group of people together, communication can break down. This challenge is faced by all companies and is a particularly important challenge because growth and success is dependent on whether your people share a vision and communicate about this vision easily.
By preparing to have fun and unwind, we seek to break down some of the communication barriers right from the outset. Feeling like we’re among friends gives us the chance to see people from a different perspective so that we’re more ready to communicate.
2. Involve Participants in a Communication (Verbal or Non-Verbal) Activity.
Essentially, communication is about participation and interaction and team success is reliant on these qualities. Simple observation is not what drives organizational success.
The Drum Cafe program seeks to bring many people together and get them working in harmony without ever speaking a single word. Throughout an hour program, the audience experiences excitement, exhilaration, and energy in their quest to align to a common goal. Participants are arranged in a circle to enhance the message of unity while the facilitator introduces a wide range of tools to improve communication. The drums are a new communication tool that the audience must learn in order to maintain a dialogue with the entire group.
While the Drum Cafe approach is based on achieving small successes, in most cases the group quickly reaches levels of success they had never imagined possible. In just a short time the Drum Café team becomes irrelevant and your team begins to coexist as an ensemble of musicians.
3. Explore Group Diversity
While the underlying message of the Drum Cafe program is unity, it begins to become clear that diversity is also an important part of any team. Take an internationally famous rock band as an example. There are many important members in a band: singer, guitarist, drummer, and bass player. Without a group of individuals with diverse skills they can never realize international success but these individuals still succeed in the context of a team. You really can’t have a successful group without diverse individuals. It is each individual’s unique contribution that drives collaboration, creativity, and ultimately success.
Our organizations are made up of people from different cultures, backgrounds, genders, ages, departments, and regions. Still, we all play an important role in the success of our company and as such we must learn effective communication techniques. The Drum Cafe program helps organizations to realize the importance of acknowledging the individual contributions that are made and how they influence the group as a whole.
4. Momentum and Enthusiasm will Drive a Shared Vision, Aligned Goals, and Team Communication
Success is realized when all parts of a company, all divisions, departments, and business units, come together and support a shared mission. In the new Drum Cafe context, communication becomes easier. The audience of a Drum Cafe program is taken to a new level of communication which is why it is essential to discuss how we managed to accomplish our goals. This intermission prepares us to take the principles we’ve learned so far and use them as we’re given more tools which complicate our ability to communicate. These melodic tools from the percussion family, including bells, shakers, claves, or scrapers, are distributed and deeper layers of communication are introduced. The message becomes more complex but the goal remains the same. The audience really starts to understand that there are virtually no limits to the level of success they can achieve when they work together in harmony.