Effective communication enhances good governance

connect with people. Dr Martin Luther King’s famous, “I have a dream” speech, to this date inspires many. Leadership is about inspiring others, through communicating a positive message, which others listen to willingly and embrace.

Good communicators are great motivators. Motivation is needed to get others to do things they normally would not do.
Passion is passing or continuing on in a charged state of faith and emotion until you get the results that you desire. Persuasion is the ability to influence others to follow a new course of action even though they may not agree with it.

Motivation, passion, persuasion, are some of the elements found in effective communication systems, which influence opinion, attitude and behaviour changes among governance stakeholders. The goal of any governance improvement drive be it at corporate or state level, should be able to inspire stakeholders to willingly embrace principles of good governance.
Leadership should be able to inspire people to walk within principles of good governance. This calls for communicators who can connect with stakeholders.

Many of the governance problems we see or hear about, are an embodiment of disconnects between and among stakeholders.
This includes among others; shareholders versus boards, boards versus shareholder relationships or between directors and management, the company and the citizens, or citizens and the state.
As we stand mesmerised by the spectacles displayed in many of the corporate scandals taking place around the world, we tend to lose sight of the simple notion of effective communication.

There are many laws and regulations being passed, in an effort to bring about sound governance. It is like having too much smoke in our eyes blinding us from the fire.
Corporate governance involves finding ways of aligning relationships and goals of stakeholders. It is also about balancing profits, people and the planet.
While laws and regulations provide important frameworks for this alignment to take place, effective communication is what oils these relationships to work.

Communication can be traced to all governance activities such as accounting and auditing, disclosure, integrated reporting, board effectiveness, corporate citizenship, social responsibility, ethical conduct etc.
The principles of fairness, inclusiveness, transparency, accountability, rule of law are all relational and communication based. In today’s world, digital communication through e-mails, texts and social media have displaced the human touch out in corporate communication. Passion for instance is difficult to decipher out of a text message. Office e-mails seldom motivate or inspire, they are instructive and to the point.

Dr Martin Luther King’s Dream speech remains inspiring not so much because of the written words, as the tone of his voice, captured in the persuasive and repetitive, “I have a dream”. This speech spoke to the hearts of people across the racial, age and geographic divide.
Without seemingly advocating speeches in corporate boardrooms and meetings, I believe that leadership in organisations needs to be heard not just read.

Most of us are challenged in communication not by speech, but by the ability to listen. Listening is just as important in effective communication. Luther had an opinion and he spoke. Obama is now being called upon to listen. Listening requires that one holds their fears at bay long enough to feel the suffering of others.
The Harvard Business Review says that listening means not getting defensive, even if one is being attacked, or disagrees with what is being said. Listening is not the same as agreeing.

It’s acknowledging and respecting the validity of someone else’s feelings. While speaking is the language of the intellect, listening is the language of emotion. The right response to anger and frustration and sadness and loss of hope is not justification. It is not to disprove the emotions or even to resolve them. The right response is to hear the emotions and making it clear that one is being listened to.
If digital gadgets have replaced the human touch, then perhaps, the corporate governance crises that we are seeing must be a cry for the restoration of humanity, because no one is listening. So how does effective communication aid the development of sound governance?

Reporting is an example of communication in corporate governance that requires human sensitivity. In line with governance principles of accountability and transparency, organisations are required to report financial and operational performances to their stakeholders.
Through integrated reporting and disclosure, organisations are expected to present, periodic financial statements, directors’ report and statement of responsibility; sustainability report, risk disclosure among others. Such reporting provides a channel for communication among shareholder, board and management and other stakeholders.

A common source of communication breakdown in reporting, includes, delays in producing such reports, thereby providing lesser time for stakeholders to carefully scrutinise the reports. Insensitivity will even cause non-production of these reports, resulting in no communication at all.
For instance, if a board pack is presented a day or two before a board meeting; it creates an atmosphere of distrust between management and the board as well as frustration. This in turn taints stakeholder relationships. In the absence of a board’s scrutiny and questioning of reports, accountability remains a formality.

Tendency is that this distrust and frustration is left unattended and becomes a bone of contention between management and the board. No apologies. No explanations and sometimes no requests from those that are supposed to receive these reports. Then, this distrust, frustration and quietness, degenerates into conflicts between the CEO and the Chairman and may pull in other stakeholders too.
Have you ever been caught in an e-mail cross fire between the Chairman and the CEO? Often times, one wish the two could meet, discuss and resolve their conflict, and there would be peace and productivity in the organisation.

The worst effect is when the conflict between the CEO and Chairman, cascades down to executive management and staff. Factions arise and the ethos becomes “you are either with us or against us”. If one does not chose a faction, then they are allocated one, to allow for clarity of the battle lines.
This is an example of the extents to which a simple reporting issue can negatively impact corporate governance and organisational culture. What baffles me is that this always gets summed up into a simple and common phrase “he/she wants me to go”. Why is humanity always trying to displace or replace one another?

Anthony K Tjian in Harvard Business Review believes that email has become a convenient mechanism for issue-avoidance. It is easier, quicker, less stressful, and less confrontational to have critical or challenging issues sent over email versus a live one-on-one with a counterpart. Conflict is part of any organisation’s life. It is how conflicts are resolved, that determines the quality of corporate governance.

It is always easier and more tempting to blame someone else for governance problems. Often times it is because there are more questions than answers, but people are afraid of saying “I do not know”, listen and learn. Perhaps this is one of the great lessons coming from the “Occupy Wall Street”, that there are more questions than answers. The protesters are asking what is fair. What do we value in our country? What is a right? Whose voice is heard?

What is the impact of the work we do? Whom do we affect in the choices we make? What do we stand for? What is important? Do we value ourselves and each other based on what we earn? What we buy? Who we are?

These questions are being asked, without anyone pretending that they know what to do. Such was the attitude of Ronald Reagan, he was not afraid to admit there were others who knew what he did not know.

Critics think that this lack of clarity on what should be done is a weakness of the protesters, but others believe that it is time for people to introspect rather than rush with answers. Perhaps this is what the late Gaddafi was asking the youthful excited soldiers who were with him in his last hours.

Debt or “dictator” which is right for the people?
Libyans made their choice. The Greeks and the Euro zone are drenched in debt? Will it cost the Prime Minister his job or Greece its Euro membership? Debt or dictators are both crises and they result in conflict?

Instead of accusations and displacement, I believe that this global governance crisis must be met with more and more questions.
Certainly emails do not capture emotions in resolving sensitive matters nor is it easy to find emotional intelligence within an email. The tone and context are easy to misread.

In a one on one conversation, how one says something, with modulations and intonations, is as important as what they are saying. With email it is hard to get the feelings behind the words.
The Harvard Business Review also explains that E-mails often promote reactive responses, as opposed to progress and action to move forward. Many people do not pause and think about what they should say in responding to an email. Hence people should consider limiting digital communications in favour of one on one, particularly when dealing with sensitive issues.

Email prolongs debates. Since no one is really actively listening, many debates continue well beyond the point of usefulness. It is also common to see a trivial and benign issue gradually escalating, because intentions and interests are easily misunderstood online. Parties keep wanting to explain further, when perhaps a hearty smile would have dissolved the misunderstanding.

A balance of effective communication and human relations is the waterway to sound governance. Just as vehicles require periodic re-alignment, communication strategies must be realigned to aid governance development and stakeholder goals. The role of the media in all this should not be trivialised.