Upward communication is a way of communicating with your management and higher-ups. It’s a form of communication that involves talking to people above you in the company hierarchy.
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Upward communication is a practice that helps you build rapport with your colleagues and clients. It’s also a way of sharing information that can help you grow as an individual because it involves looking at your job in a broader context.
For example, if you’re a salesperson, upward communication might mean thinking about ways to improve your selling skills and strategies, or maybe it means thinking about how to improve the product itself — maybe it could use some tweaks to make it more appealing to customers.
The point here is that upward communication doesn’t just happen by accident; you have to be intentional about creating opportunities for it to happen.
The best upward communications are those where each person in the chain knows exactly what another is doing. The reason for this is that it allows people to share information with each other and coordinate their efforts toward a common goal.
Upward communication could be an email, text message, or phone call. It can also be used to refer to the process of informing other employees about changes in policies or procedures.
The Pros & Cons
Upward communication is a way of communicating with your superiors in a more direct way than you would normally do. It is a great way of building trust and fostering collaboration, especially in virtual working setups.
There are many benefits of upward communication:
Increases The Effectiveness Of The Team
The team can build a stronger sense of unity, which increases the effectiveness of the team.
It helps with communication, as it allows you to share ideas and communicate with each other. This can lead to better decision-making and more effective work.
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It provides you with a way to keep your team members in touch with the big picture and help them stay on top of the latest developments.
It can also be used as a tool for coaching, giving feedback, and building on one another’s ideas.
Provides The Boss-Interaction ROI
It can be used to let your boss know about any problems in the department so that they can be solved and prevent future issues from occurring.
It can also be used to let your boss know about any upcoming projects or deadlines, which will allow them to plan accordingly and help ensure smooth operations.
Helps You Build And Leverage A Network
It allows you to build a network of people who can help you get work done. This is especially important if you’re just starting out, because you may not have much experience in the industry or area where you’re trying to get hired.
It enables you to leverage your network to get access to resources that don’t necessarily come through traditional channels.
For example, if someone in your network has a good connection in an organization that would normally be closed off, then you can call them up and ask for an introduction or help with this project.
Although there are many advantages of upward communication, there are also some cons:
Keeps You In The Dark
Lack of feedback. Your boss gets all the information, but you don’t receive any feedback.
Lack of motivation. If you’re not getting any feedback or recognition for your work, how can you feel motivated?
Lack of transparency. There is no way to find out if the message was received, which makes it hard to deal with possible errors or misunderstandings.
If your message is not important enough, it may be ignored or lost in the pile of other messages that come in during the day.
Injects High Probability Of Miscommunication
It’s easier to miscommunicate in a virtual working setup than in the real world, where people can see each other’s faces, body language, and expressions.
It can be difficult to get people to listen. So, you may have to repeat your message more than once before it gets through to the person who needs to hear it most urgently.
For example, if you’re a manager, you might find that your employees are slow to respond and don’t offer their input on important decisions. This is because they feel they should have been consulted before any decision was made.
Can Be Awkward And Impersonal (At Most Times)
Even though it is a very effective way to get your ideas across, it is a very time-consuming process.
It can make it difficult for employees to do their job properly if they do not feel comfortable talking to their superiors or peers directly.
It can feel impersonal and cold if you don’t know the person well enough to connect with them on a personal level. This means that you need to make sure that you have a good rapport with your team members so that you can build trust between you and your colleagues.
Upward vs Downward Communication
Upward communication occurs when the management culture encourages employees to proactively reach out to their superiors to communicate ideas, and share feedback. Downward communication, on the other hand, is the traditional structure where communication happens from the manager, or those at the top, to those reporting to them. Here, the onus of managing up meetings is on the manager.
Upward communication is intended to help the recipient think about the problem, whereas downward communication is meant to inform the recipient.
For example, if you are writing a paper for class, you would not expect to receive an email from your professor thanking you for your hard work. You would instead expect that the professor would send out an email with corrections or suggestions on how to improve your paper. This type of communication is meant for the professor, not for you.
Upward communication involves more people at a higher level of the hierarchy, whereas downward communication involves fewer people at a lower level of the hierarchy.
In an organization with a vertical structure, upward communication processes involve all members of management, while downward communication processes involve only some members of management.
However, even when there is only one person involved in upward communications or just one member in downward communications, it still requires some form of planning to ensure that everyone involved has the information they need to perform their job effectively.
Even though an employee has access to all of the data they need for work purposes, they may not always need it immediately. This is where downward communication comes into play as it allows them to share information with other departments within their organization so that they can use this information and make decisions based on it.
Challenges With Upward Communication In Virtual Working Setup
In a remote work setup, there are several challenges that one needs to be aware of.
Very Scheduling-Heavy
It’s difficult to walk over to your manager for a quick chat. So everything needs to be scheduled, which is good and bad. If something comes up, you always have to wait until the next meeting. That can be frustrating for both parties involved.
If the boss’ calendar is always full, subordinates may not feel comfortable sharing feedback spontaneously, and this can get lost in translation when the time comes for feedback/feedback sessions.
Not Nearly As Effective As Face-To-Face Meetings
Online meetings are simply not as effective as face-to-face because of both tech issues as well as not being physically present.
If you’re having an online meeting with your boss there’s no way that you can communicate clearly enough to express your thoughts and feelings about something that happened at work or what you think about a new project that they have assigned you.
It’s almost impossible for two people who are thousands of miles apart from each other to have an effective conversation when they’re sitting on their computers at home or the office.
Provides No Way Of Measuring The Work Impact
It can be difficult to gauge the impact of your work. This is especially true when you are using a tool like Slack, where you can’t see what your colleagues are doing.
For example, if you’re working on a big project, and someone else in your team asks for help on something related to that project, but there’s no way for them to directly contact you about it — or even if there is, it could take hours before they have time to respond — then their request might not get passed along to you at all.
If someone makes an error in their work, it could be very hard for them to know how much damage was done and how much work needs to be redone.
Logistically Quite Difficult
The key challenge with upward communication is that it can be very difficult to do in a virtual working setup.
When you work from home or in an office located far away from other people, it can be difficult to communicate with them by text message or phone call. This is especially true if you’re just starting out with your new company or moving into a new office where everyone else has worked for years together and knows each other very well already.
Execution-Difficulty Increases With Employee Headcount
While the Covid pandemic may look like it’s on the way out, it has still pushed a lot of organizations, both big and small into a permanent remote work model. If your company is small and doesn’t have many employees yet, then upward communication problems may not be a major issue.
However, suppose your company has grown significantly and now has dozens of employees who regularly meet each other every day in person and chat online together as well. In that case, having upward communication issues could become more challenging than ever before.
It can be difficult to get all of your team members on the same page. This is especially true if you have a geographically dispersed team or one that works remotely.
How To Make Upward Communication Effective?
Upward communication is a great way for employees to give feedback on how they feel about their work, what they think is working well and what could be done better.
Also, upward communication is essential to maintain the right culture.
Upward communication is a powerful tool that can help improve the workplace culture of your organization. But it only works if you set the right expectations and engagement rules.
Here are some ways to make upward communication effective:
Periodic Meetings = Achieving Goals
Schedule periodic one-on-ones with the boss(es) as part of workplace mandates. You can set up these meetings around quarterly or annual goals and objectives. This will help you stay on track with your business goals and objectives.
Rely Heavily On Feedback
Integrate feedback apps with Slack with which employees can provide feedback. You can also make use of anonymous feedback apps depending on the nature of the feedback provided (e.g., survey).
Monitor eNPS (Employee Net Promoter Score) constantly so that you can get real-time feedback about how your employees feel about their job at any moment in time.
Build A Culture Of Open Communication
Hire leaders who are aligned with this culture. It helps all involved parties understand each other’s expectations and requirements better before starting off on any project together with you.
Make sure that both (or all) parties have similar goals and visions for your projects so that they can work together effectively without any complications or disputes arising between them over which approach should be taken or how things should be done.
Invest In The Right Communication Platforms
Some upward communication can be async while others have to be synced (phone call, for example).
Invest in the right communication platforms (e.g., video conferencing) that enable this culture and ensure that everyone in your team understands it too!
Maintain Tech-Homogeneity
Make sure that your team members have access to the same tools and resources. This will help them become familiar with the technology and will make it easier for them to connect, and share files and documents easily.
Ultimately, effective communication is one of the most vital aspects of any business. Given the necessary changes in how we work that technology has wrought upon us, it’s become even more important to be clear and direct in how we communicate with our co-workers. Upward communication may seem like it would eat into the time that you spend getting things done, but if you use it right and master it, then it can help your team save a lot of time and effort on repetitive tasks.
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