Leader Communication Strategies Critical Paths to Improving Employee Commitment

This article addresses how key leader communication strategies can increase worker loyalty. Leader communication has long been shown to be a critical factor in superior worker motivation and performance and has great potential to aid organizations in their quest for committed employees. Organizations need for committed employees is now acute due to such recent shifts in the business environment as the current economic slowdown, skilled worker shortages, increasing ethnic and cultural diversity, rapid technological innovations, and growing organizational reliance on knowledge workers to achieve competitive advantage. Research clearly shows that leader communication practices play an integral role in developing and sustaining the employee commitment demanded by the preceding scenarios. However, leaders are often faced with a plethora of options and communication techniques that are not directly linked with strategic goals. To make sense of these various communication tactics, leaders need a systemic method which links practice to results. Employee commitment is one of the most important measures of leader success. Worker commitment reaps benefits far beyond improved organizational performance. (High levels of employee loyalty have been linked to an estimated 11% boost in productivity. Commitment also explains more than 34% of employee turnover. Furthermore, loyal workers enhance an organizations reputation in the job market; and this elevated status helps to recruit better employees. These valuable benefits of employee loyalty can only be achieved through high levels of effective leader communication. Leader communication is independent variable and worker performance, job satisfaction, trust and loyalty are dependent variable. Such positive relations depend largely on competent leadership skills, many of which are firmly grounded in communication abilities including listening/feedback, coaching, and information-sharing. Fortunately, these skills can be learned. Research also shows that leader communication abilities can be improved as a result of training, and this improvement positively effects the performance of direct reports.

Moreover, communication is a powerful catalyst for establishing and sustaining trust, the emotional state that is shared by highly committed workers and leaders. Leader communication is the bridge that transmits behavioral intent to employees, thus creating the foundation for trust.

SELECTED LEADER COMMUNICATION SKILLS AND PRACTICES

This section examines applicable leader communication skills and practices that help to generate organizational loyalty. These techniques include across-the-board guidelines, listening/feedback, coaching, and information-sharing. To be effectively implemented; however, these methods require the proper organizational context. Organizational loyalty is best nurtured when communication practices take place in an organizational culture that places high value on and engenders trust in employees. Reina and Reina identified communication trust as one of the four major components of cultures that embody trust in the workplace. Equally important, these authors and other management experts theorize that culture and communication practices have an interactive influence with each other.

Organizations with high trust cultures have distinct managerial communication practices that emerge to encourage organizational comment. These practices were identified by a contemporary, broad based study on successful leader communication policies in companies that were coping with major restructuring changes the authors identified a set of five principal communication practices in which these companies were always involved, regardless of their change initiatives: 1) Managers explain why decisions are made; 2) Communication occurs in a timely manner; 3) Important information flows continuously; 4) Direct supervisors and other leaders explain the specific implications of environmental and organizational changes to each level of workers; and 5) Employee responses to leader communications are validated. In other words, emotions are accepted by managers for what they are, not what they should be. Other leadership experts have listed additional factors as essential to loyalty- enhancing communication practices. Two classic studies extol the merits of active listening in leaderworker relations, and the managerial insights that can be gained from observing employee verbal

metaphors, office settings, and body language. Similarly, Goman noted that optimal leader communication activities involve effective listening skills and understanding ones own communication style. Most communication experts agree that active listening is a major factor. Active listening includes such behaviors as empathetic body language (eye contact, appropriate gestures and expressions), posing helpful questions, validating employee expression through considerate conversation turn-taking, and paraphrasing to ensure mutual understanding. Feedback is another group of communication skills that is both critical to fostering loyalty and integrally linked with listening. Reina & Reina included give and receive constructive feedback. Importantly, the authors emphasized the necessity for feedback timeliness and mutuality. To achieve mutuality, leaders must be receptive to honest, useful criticism from employees. These leader communication practices are aligned with recent performance management innovations in multi source feedback. With multi source feedback, leaders receive developmental input on performance from a variety of relevant, anonymous sources. In addition, constructive leader feedback is significantly linked with other worker loyalty-related outcomes such as performance, self-confidence, recognition, and emotional bonding. Guidance and listening are also incorporated into the communication activities of coaching. This behavior has been defined as counseling that is oriented towards subordinates personal development. The coaching roles more democratic aspects have also been incorporated into the leaders information sharing communication functions. Information-sharing contradicts more traditional, autocratic leader communication tactics that withhold and control information as a source of personal power. Organizations are increasing their information sharing to employees due to rapid innovations in technology, especially in the area of human resource information systems. In addition to greater personal control, high technology based information-sharing reinforces worker loyalty due to its perception as organizational responsiveness to hectic schedules and work/family balance.

THE MOTIVATING LANGUAGE MODEL The preceding leader communication practices are known to have positive influences on worker loyalty. Unfortunately, situational factors can substantially impact these tactics effectiveness. For example, listening skills may be applied more successfully by leaders in conflict resolution

scenarios than in hands-on training sessions. Furthermore, as high technology innovations increase in complexity and number, leaders find that selecting the most goal appropriate communication options and media is sometimes bewildering. What leaders need is a strategic communication framework to help them chose the most effective communication practices. Motivating Language Theory (MLT) offers such a comprehensive model by guiding leaders in communication tactics that improve worker outcomes. The predictive power of MLT rests on a few simple assumptions. First, Motivating Language represents all three speech acts as defined by linguistics research, the basic or minimal units of linguistic communication. . . where language takes the form of rules governed, intentional behavior. Thus, MLT applies to most forms of leader-worker oral communication. These three types of speech acts translate into organizational settings as the following: 1) Perlocutionary or direction-giving language occurs when a boss facilitates worker performance by clarifying tasks, goals, and rewards while reducing ambiguity. This language is similar to leader speech used in goal setting and MBO initiatives. 2) Illocutionary or empathetic language takes place when leaders express compassion and humanity to workers. Compliments for performance and special consideration for work or personal problems are examples of empathetic language. Finally, 3) Lectionary or meaning-making language happens when a leader explains the cultural norms, values, and behaviors that are unique to every organization. The second and third assumptions that support MLT are congruent with the other forms of trust inducing leader communications that are discussed in this study. Namely, leaders must also walk their talk, and subordinates must understand the intended messages that leaders send. Lastly, Motivating Language Theory assumes that leaders will achieve the best results when all three forms of speech acts are used at appropriate times. MLTs positive relationship with worker job satisfaction and performance has been well-supported by research. The Motivating Language Model presents a clear, practical strategic path for improving worker loyalty through leader speech. Overall, MLTs greatest value may be in its role as a planning/measurement tool for implementing leader trust development programs. Towards these and related goals, the model offers multiple benefits since it can also be applied as leader communication assessment, a leader training guide, and as a framework for choosing appropriate leader communications to increase worker loyalty.