The Covid-19 outbreak is changing the way we communicate – and that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
From the moment President Cyril Ramaphosa declared the Covid-19 outbreak a national disaster, there’s been a lot happening in the country. Many businesses put plans in place to ensure that their workforces are able to work from home.
With employees no longer in the same space, they have to use the technology available to them in order to communicate. But without the means to instantly clarify any misunderstanding verbally, and by removing body language from the equation, initial communication undoubtedly proved tricky.
In our company, the Marketing team was one of the first departments to start working remotely. A bunch of creatives, who express themselves through intonation and body language, were forced to use Zoom for meetings and WhatsApp and Slack as communication channels. The first day was slightly overwhelming as devices and channels were constantly pinging. Day two went better.
And as we each sat down to our morning team meeting at the end of the week, we realised that the most incredible thing had happened. We had already adapted to the new way of communicating but more than that, we had improved the way in which we communicated.
Where there was a lot of noise in our channels previously, funny moments or after-weekend catchups, there now was none. Our messages were much more considered and we were all very cognisant of the fact that we had to ensure we delivered each message as clearly and concisely as possible from the start.
We understand that there is very little room for error and misunderstanding and now practice, what the team dubbed, conscious communication. And I love it.
I won’t lie, I miss being around my colleagues. But as a communicator, I’m so proud of how well they are handling this remote communication thing.