Tools to Improve Employee Communication

Effective employee communication is essential to creating and maintaining a positive workspace that people want to come back to. However, despite the obvious importance of employee communication, many employers still struggle to keep their teams engaged and informed.

The numbers tell the tale. A recent study found that 80 percent of the U.S. workforce reports feeling stressed because of ineffective communication—a 30 percent increase from last year. On top of that, 63 percent of U.S. employees are so frustrated with poor communication that they want to quit their jobs and move on to an organization that communicates openly and often.

Numbers like these can certainly be discouraging. However, with access to the right tools, you can improve employee communication, boost engagement, and increase the likelihood of retaining top talent. In this blog post, we’ll discuss the state of communication in the modern workplace and share examples of different tools that can help improve employee communication at your organization.

Facilitating Strong Communication in the Workplace

The importance of strong communication in the workplace is nothing new. However, in an increasingly digital world, communication tools are essential to keeping employees happy, connected, and informed. Organizations are finding that they must introduce digital communication tools to empower employees to work together effectively, regardless of role or location.

Although communication tools can dramatically improve the way employees interact and work together, the technology alone isn’t enough. According to organizational expert Karen Jaw-Madson, the solution to better communication across companies is a mix of culture, engagement, and technology. Pairing the right tools with the right environment—one that celebrates collaboration and internal communication—is the key to fostering workplace engagement.

Tools You Can Use to Improve Employee Communication and Collaboration in the Workplace

Despite the obvious benefits to adopting tools that improve employee communication and collaboration, many companies are still struggling to get it right. Slack’s Future of Work Study found that only 31 percent of workers are “extremely satisfied” with their current work communication tools, whereas 76 percent hope to have more communication tools available to them in the future.

Here are a few tools that you can explore to craft a more engaged, productive work environment for your employees.

Google Collaboration Apps

Google’s G Suite is a cloud-based set of collaboration and productivity tools, including:

• Gmail

• Google Docs

• Hangouts Meet

• Hangouts Chat

• Google Calendar

• Google Drive

• Google Slides

• Google Sheets

• Google Sites

• Google Keep

• Google Jamboard

These tools offer everything you need to connect and collaborate with coworkers—regardless of where they hang their hats. With shared calendars, convenient scheduling, and the ability to collaborate on documents, spreadsheets, and slides in real time, it’s no wonder that so many organizations are using Google collaboration tools to foster effective teamwork.

PwC, one of the world’s largest consulting firms, turned to G Suite “to solve problems creatively through engaged collaboration.”

“By giving our teams the right tools to collaborate, we’re helping them to create and compete in new ways,” explains Deborah Bothun, PwC’s U.S. entertainment, media, and communications leader. “With G Suite tools, our teams are more engaged, productive and mobile. And we’re adding more value for our clients, at a faster pace, as a result.”

Interactive Org Chart Software

Live org charts drive engagement in more ways than one. Providing employees with access to various systems and communication tools helps them work more efficiently and feel more connected to the organization as a whole. Interactive org charts support engagement by encouraging employees to cultivate relationships at work and seamlessly collaborate with team members.

Personalized Employee Profiles

Workplace communication is made simple with Pingboard’s interactive employee directory and customizable profiles. Employee profiles feature photos, bios, skills, interests, fun facts, team information, custom fields, and contact information.

Even better, all employee data is searchable. Employees can search by location, skills, team, interests, job titles, and other filters to locate people within the organization. With 49 percent of surveyed employees citing trouble locating necessary documents and information, having easy access to these details is a clear advantage—not to mention a huge time-saver for employees at all levels.

Who’s Who Game

Ninety percent of employees said they are more productive when they engage in some form of gamification at work. Enter Pingboard’s Who’s Who game.

Who’s Who is an interactive flash card game that offers a fun, engaging way for employees to learn names and faces. This helps employees get to know coworkers, whether they’re a new hire or visiting another office location—there’s even a leaderboard to show who knows the company best!

Mobile Contact Syncing

The digital directory and customizable profiles are also available on mobile devices, where today’s employees naturally interact. Pingboard features mobile contact syncing, which provides easy access to employee contact details when people are on the go.

Company Slack Channel

Instant messaging has become increasingly popular in the workplace in recent years. As companies look for more efficient channels for communicating and collaborating across departments and locations, instant messaging is slowly but surely taking over workplace communication.

Slack recently shared that it now has 10 million-plus daily active users around the world. Employees from well-known companies such as Lyft are among them. Lyft started using Slack to help connect dispersed teams and to encourage real-time, cross-functional collaboration—and the results speak for themselves.

“Slack is business done right,” says Benjamin Sternsmith, Lyft’s VP of sales. “When you have collaboration happening in one spot, leadership doesn’t need to be copied on an email. You can hop into a Slack channel, cruise along with the project, and jump in where needed.” 

Pingboard + Slack Integration

Recognizing that Slack has become a go-to communication tool for most companies, Pingboard launched a Slack integration add-on that allows employees to quickly message team members straight from their profile. Slack usernames are automatically shown to make it as easy as possible for coworkers to communicate and collaborate with one another.

Ensuring effective two-way employee communication isn’t always easy—but with the right tools and resources, it’s a much easier feat. Say goodbye to outdated forms of communication at work and embrace tools designed for the modern workplace to improve the way your employees interact on a daily basis.