Hello everyone! I hope you are all doing well, my name is Danny Reidel. I am a senior supply chain management major in the Sidhu School of Business. I have a sports management minor as well. In addition, I work at the Allan P. Kirby Center, where I serve as a scholar of center operations and logistics. I began working at the center as an intern before I was promoted to a scholar position after gaining experience. I am also a student-athlete and a part of the inaugural ice hockey team here at Wilkes University, which is something I take a lot of pride in.
Being a part of organizations like the APKC and the men's ice hockey team have taught me that the most important key to success is communication. Just like with sports, in a business, communication can be the difference between a winning company and a losing company. With that being said, there are plenty of ways to communicate within an organization to keep it winning. The best part about communication is there are so many different ways to creatively communicate with each other. The following tips are creative suggestions or ways to keep communication flowing in an organization in order to keep it fun and sustain a healthy environment.
Plan External Events
Planning external events is one fun way to keep communication flowing in an organization. When attending these events with teammates or co-workers, you all have something in common that will be talked about. That directly improves and enhances communication about what certain departments are doing or what individuals are thinking in general that you may not be able to talk about in other circumstances. These external events can differ from attending sporting events, to getting lunches or dinners, or even just by getting together to going bowling. I know from personal experience that our hockey team does several community service events, where we are all together and talking about a multitude of topics while helping people, which helps create camaraderie.
Encourage Information Sharing
Sharing information is important to transparent communication. It is useful to understand the work that is done throughout the team or company as a whole and not just about what you are doing individually. Yes, your individual work is important, but it is also important to let everyone know what you are doing and that the common goal between everyone is being achieved with the help of everyone's individual work.
This could be as easy as setting up a delegation board in the office, so everyone sees it when they walk by. By doing this, people can see what projects other people are working on and that nothing goes unnoticed. Also, if there is a question about a certain project, then it would be an easy way to find someone to talk to about it in order to answer that question. (I would personally create some type of design/theme or have some decorations to go along with the delegation board. A boring board would probably fail so keep it intriguing and entertaining! Maybe holiday decorations to go with the season!)
These are just two of many ways to get communication flowing within an organization. These are strategies that I have personally found to be effective when working with organizations. As different as working at the APKC and being on the hockey team are, there is always that one important key to success that they will have in common. Communication is key to maintaining a healthy and successful environment.
Thanks for reading my blog, and I hope you can try using one of these methods of keeping a happy environment!
- Danny