What are our communication best practices? How do we communicate now? What gaps are there in our current way of doing things? How do you enable borderless communication in a physical environment? How does ideal state communication holistically look like at 2U? Right now we have email, Slack, meetings, in-person, call, text, with the first four as the main methods. What if I combined the urgency-importance matrix with types of communication?
Well actually I think communication comes down to organization of thoughts and priority. Emails & meetings are essentially more structured than Slack or casual convos. So here it comes down to what is the objective of the communication? What is being communicated? And how is the best way to deliver that message? Some things written form is better, some things verbal are better. Verbal is better when you need to have a (quick) discussion and potentially decide something? Instead of going back and forth text / Slack for 15-20 min, you can have that convo verbally in 1-2,5 min max.
QA. Priority. Resolution.
So here again you need to find the resolution of the message/ discussion point. Work backwards from there. Focus / distraction. One resolution of an email / thread is to set up a call / meeting. So instead of sending emails back and forth determining what time people are available, just include a Calendly link for various lengths of chats. I think having 5,15,30, and 60 min options are the best to cover any length of topic. 5 min to resolve anything quickly and potentially anything high priority. In that case, a call is probably better.
At the beginning of the week, asking what questions do I have for people. Living doc like what I had when I first started? The thing I'm trying to optimize for is focus. Focus for work; focus on the resolution of the topic. VAF model here? Vision-Alignment-Focus. Vision is the what; the resolution. Alignment is...
Well, so external is actually a bit easier I think. You're either trying to set up a meeting (progressive action item),...
You're actually trying to do one or several of the steps outlined in my previous entry about the journey of an agenda item. Gain an understanding, perform a clarifying action item, make a decision, or perform a progressive action item.
[Break from Thursday evening to Friday night]
Hmm, the main factor there between Slack and email is how quickly can the item be resolved. Resolution speed. It doesn't necessarily need to be high priority or high urgency on Slack, it's just how quickly can it be resolved through Slack. How much communication is required for an item to get resolved? Things that require the most communication probably needs a meeting. Things that require the least amount of communication is probably good in Slack. Slack is the digital version of popping over to someone's desk and saying "Hey, quick question..." Email is the digital version of a meeting. So what it comes down to then is the resolution speed and resolution organization.
(see quadrant(s) in pic)
Can be resolved quickly X needs organization: Email
Can be resolved quickly X doesn't need much organization: Slack
Takes time to be resolved / many things to resolve X needs organization: Meeting
Takes time to be resolved / many things to resolve X doesn't need organization: Quick chat
I actually think we do a decent job of already doing this, except one area. Sometimes we'll Slack stuff that is better resolved as a quick chat. So what ends up taking 15-20 min on Slack could have been accomplished in <5 min in a quick chat.
So there are 3 questions we need to ask in every communication: 1) What is the desired resolution? 2) How quickly can it be resolved? 3) How organized does it need to be to be resolved?
If people understand the general framework, then they will have the flexibility to choose whichever method depending on the level of focus and urgency / priority of the item. Again, nothing too rigid but just an awareness framework. And it's not strict quadrants, but fluid spectrums. Not discrete, but continuous. Ok, you know what time it is...
Current added value (CAV)
Alignment on definition of resolution
When to use what method of communication
Asking those questions
Future added value (FAV)
New hires understand what to use when
Another part of Operating System → increased liquidation value
Can adapt as we scale and grow
Current reduced friction (CRF)
Wasted time is decreased using inefficient method
Future reduced friction (FRF)
If we iterate, we already have an established framework to work on
Current reduced value (CRV)
Is this framework accurate in practice?
Future reduced value (FRV)
Will this be accurate as we grow?
Current added friction (CAF)
People's current preferred ways of communication might change
Wasting time referencing quadrant to communicate the 'right way' instead of the goal of communication being more efficient
Future added friction (FAF)
Something else for people to learn
I need to use examples when building this out all the way. The other aspect / dimension to this is priority, which itself is an intersection of urgency and importance, which is something I've discussed previously. All of these methods can be low priority all the way to highest priority. I think it's up to the communicators, especially the initiator, to indicate what level of priority this is. Maybe just say P1 before the message if it's really urgent and important or P8 if it's not. So people are able to allocate their time and energy towards truly P1 things.
Ok, so staying on the communication theme, when do we have gaps in communication? When are we asking ourselves "Oh this person or team should have been involved in the process."? Me with Bloom for example. Tech with ops during initial rollout. I think it's on the project level basis / KR level basis. All the stakeholders don't necessarily need to be involved at every phase of the project, but some do at certain points, and others at other points. So the phases of a KR project plan are essentially the milestones. So let's say we have a RACI chart. The KR owner is the Accountable. The task / milestone assignee is the Responsible. Those are the easy ones. So Informed is at least the Functional Team. Since we're still pretty small now, Informed is probably the larger team, especially if it's a milestone. Those ones people don't have to think about. However, all I think we need to do is add a column 'Consulted' for the milestones to indicate if anyone else needs to be consulted to complete the milestone. Informed is the updates we have in meetings with all team members. Pretty simple solution actually if it can be implemented effectively.
CAV
Better team-wide communication
Transparency for who needs to be involved
Planning milestone achievement effectively
CRF
Decreased last minute involvement of team members → less unhappiness and decreased stress
Thinking of who needs to be involved at every junction
FAV
Setting tone for new hires
Becomes a habit within business OS
Can see how accurate it's been
FRF
Increased communication and collaboration
CRV
Is it correct in actuality?
CAF
Too small of a scale to do for each milestone so increased work for less ROI
More work into the process
FRV
FAF
More things to have in OS so people don't want to do it
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