Optimizing internal communications among team members has always been an important priority for any company. Ensuring team members have effective means of staying in touch with one another doesn’t merely boost the odds of all members of a workforce understanding what tasks they should be focusing on throughout a given day. A proper internal communications strategy can also raise employee engagement, which may in turn yield such advantages as higher levels of productivity, lower turnover, and more.
Identifying reliable internal communications solutions is particularly important now that remote work is becoming more common. Even before the pandemic forced many companies to embrace remote work policies, organizations across a range of industries were experimenting with remote work due to the numerous benefits such policies have been shown to offer.
That said, leveraging the benefits of remote work policies must also involve addressing some of the challenges that organizations encounter when employees do not share the same office. For example, if your team members work remotely, you need to implement the right internal communications solutions to avoid confusion, lack of engagement, etc.
That doesn’t necessarily mean you need to spend more than you can afford to when doing so. A quick search will reveal there are plenty of internal communications tools and programs available. The fact that some are more expensive than others does not guarantee they are more useful. Affordable but effective solutions to internal communications issues include the following:
SMS
Odds are good most of your workers now have smartphones. You may be able to issue them such devices if they don’t already own them.
Thus, there’s also a good chance your employees will be able to receive and send text messages. Using SMS text messaging for internal communications is quite cost-friendly when compared to many other potential options. Additionally, because most (if not all) of your workers will already be thoroughly familiar with how this form of communication works, there won’t be a learning curve that sometimes prevents new internal communications solutions from immediately becoming natural elements of a team’s operations.
The Intranet
SMS messaging is very helpful when your employees are on-the-go. However, it might not be the only solution worth considering. While you should definitely keep it in mind when equipping your team with internal communications solutions, you should also remember that the best approach to internal communications is often one that includes a variety of methods.
For example, sending longer messages and emails via SMS can prove challenging. That’s why you should complement your SMS methods with a company intranet. Although new messaging apps have grown abundant in recent years, many have determined that a robust intranet with email services and related features is still more affordable and intuitive than newer solutions may claim to be.
Newsletters
“Time is money.”
What is that old adage so popular? Because it’s true. Whenever you can find ways to save time without cutting corners, you should. Doing so will translate to greater revenue.
One way to save more time than you might initially realize is to send regular employee newsletters featuring vital updates. Instead of wasting valuable time deciding which workers and departments should receive which emails, in cases when you’re sharing information that can be theoretically relevant to most members of an organization, including it in a newsletter is a simple and efficient way to reduce the amount of time you might otherwise spend on this task.
Again, it’s likely that making improvements to your internal communications strategy will become even more significant in the near future. These tips will help you make said improvements while also staying within your budget.
