You Can't Not Communicate

Let me preface this post by saying that the title of this post is the same as a book written by David Grossman, but the content of this post is not based on that same book.  I do own the book but (note to Mr. Grossman: you shouldn’t read the read of this sentence) haven’t read beyond the first twenty or so pages because they really weren’t that inspiring.  So regardless of how closely this blog post may or may not be to the book of the same title it was neither taken from nor inspired by the book of the same title.

You are always communicating—it is impossible not to.  You have the choice of actively controlling the message that you want to communicate or passively communicating a message that may or may not be what you want.  Either way you are always communicating.

Say, for example, you’re out of the office for a few days attending an industry conference.  By turning on your email out-of-office assistant you are actively communicating to anyone who emails you that you have limited availability and it might be a day or two before you respond.  If you didn’t they might think that you’re ignoring them or don’t value them enough to reply.  Hopefully this is not the case, but by not actively communicating you are losing control of the message because you can’t not communicate.

The same is true if you’re working on a project for a client.  If you provide regular status updates—even if those updates describe that there is no activity on the project or that you have encountered issues but you are working to resolve them—you are communicating a message that you are on top of things.  If you don’t provide regular updates your client might perceive that your silence means that you are on track and everything is a-OK, but alternately they might think that you’re having problems and don’t want them to know.  Your communication doesn’t have to be much: a quick phone call or short email might suffice or if you want to really impress them you could provide regular and formal project status reports.  Either way, you can control the message by actively communicating or you can passively communicate and leave your message to chance.  (Shameless plug:  contact us and we'll help you create a professional project status report or other technical documentation.)

Have you ever been to the website of a company that provides a product or service that you need, checked out their company blog and seen that the last posting was made months earlier?  What message does that project?  Maybe you think that they’re so wonderfully busy that they just don’t have time to maintain their blog.  Or maybe you think that they can’t afford the resources to keep their blog current or that they’re not good at following through on things that they start.  Do either of those thoughts fill you with enough confidence to engage them?  Probably not.

Conclusion

In today’s world we are always communicating whether we like it or not.  You can take charge of the message by actively communicating or you can do nothing and passively communicate a message that may or may not be accurate.  Your communication doesn’t have to be fancy—an automated reply email, a quick phone call or a full blown project status report are all ways that you can actively communicate the message that you want.

Got something to say? Leave a comment below, we’d love to hear from you! Got a question that we can address in our blog? Contact us through our website or email me directly and we’ll put our crack team to work and let you know when we post a reply.

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Steve Hartley, Managing Partner

Fering Communications Inc.
Website: www.feringcommunications.com
Email: steve.hartley@feringcommunications.com