I’ve recently spent several hours considering what feels like an insurmountable challenge:
How can my company update our communication practices for the new era of hybrid work?
Back in March 2020, many of us were surprised at how relatively seamless the transition to remote work was, once our technology needs were met and our use of new tools routinized.
But that relative ease masked the subtle, insidious issue that would percolate over the next two years: We were no longer sure how to communicate with one another.
I don’t mean that literally, of course. We all still knew how to send an email and pick up the phone.
I mean instead that the proliferation of communication channels following this transition to remote/hybrid work involved the accrual of new communication channels—and none of us have a clear idea of how to best utilize these new channels.
Every organization has experienced some version of this in the past decade. In addition to email, many workplaces now have some type of chat function (Teams, Slack, Yammer) and group-based chat or channel space (Slack, Teams), in addition to a plethora of other communication channels—PDF mark-ups, Track Change comments in Word, social media, text messaging, and on and on.
I’m only in the early stages of feeling out this problem—outlining some of the existing issues and talking with other team members to gauge their takes on the situation—but I’m looking forward to digging deeper into how to introduce more clarity into what is at present a real hodgepodge of conflicting attitudes and expectations.
Taylor Coe 