Think You're Overcommunicating? Your Team Disagrees

Forbes

15-05-2025

We think that we are communicating enough as leaders, but in reality, our teams need more ... More information and hate when we don't give it to them.
Employees are bombarded with information. Slack channels. Company newsletters. Team emails. Text messages. All-hands meetings. Empathetic managers understand the communication deluge that their employees are under, and may not want to add to the daily noise that bombards their employees. Managers may be hesitant to send yet another email articulating the weekly priorities, or provide their team a second overview of the goals of the product launch, or share a third reminder of the new benefit being rolled out.
In doing so, managers may feel that they are overcommunicating to their teams, and adding to their employees' information overload, which can create stress and anxiety.
Yet, the opposite is actually true: employees hate when their managers don't communicate enough, and don't mind when their managers overcommunicate. Research by Francis Flynn and Chelsea Lide of Stanford University in 2023 shows that not only are managers far more likely to be seen as undercommunicating than overcommunicating, but also those leaders who undercommunicate are ten times more likely to be criticized than those who overcommunicate.
Leaders who undercommunicate are ten times more likely to be criticized than those who overcommunicate.
And, there are consequences beyond criticism when managers undercommunicate. 61% of employees who are considering leaving their jobs list poor internal communication as a key factor, according to a survey conducted by the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism and Staffbase in 2024. Going even further, in a poll conducted by Axios, 42% of employees said they have left a job because of poor communication.
In short, your employees think you undercommunicate and hate that you do.
And if you overcommunicate? That's okay. Your employees don't mind the extra information as much as you might think. So you should err on the side of overcommunicating. But, you still need to overcommunicate well. In the same Axios survey, about 60% of employees say that their leaders' communications aren't effective.
Here are three strategies to overcommunicate effectively:
Use More Concrete Language
Often we fall into jargon and acronyms when we are communicating at work. Terms like OKRs, KPIs, 'leveraging growth,' and 'scaling organizations' are frequently used. But, according to Construal Level Theory, a concept developed by psychologists Yaacov Trope and Nira Liberman, these abstract words often used in corporate emails and PowerPoints may make employees feel more distant from the message (and tune those messages out). Instead, using language that is concrete, such as talking about a specific customer, or the details of a product feature, make employees feel psychologically closer to the content of the message.
Communicate Via Different Modes
Communicating via different modes doesn't just mean, send an email and put a message in a Slack channel to share important information with your team. We all absorb information slightly differently. One employee might need to see a visual diagram to understand the new strategy, whereas someone else might need to ask a lot of questions and talk it out in a meeting to fully absorb the content. Share the information in many different ways. Acknowledge A Range Of Emotions
Often messages are dismissed when the tone of the communication is incongruous to what the recipient is currently experiencing. For example, an email extolling the benefits of the new reimbursement software rankles the employees who are frustrated by yet another technology change. Acknowledge multiple perspectives in your communications so that those employees who are experiencing different reactions aren't left out.
Keep Overcommunicating
I once worked with a colleague whose favorite saying was, 'repetition never hurts the prayer.' He repeated this mantra during a period when we were navigating how to share information with employees about a company restructuring. It reminded us of the steady drumbeat of updates we needed to provide to our team. As leaders, it's easy to forget that your employees don't have access to the same information you are spending your day poring over. Effective leaders are those who communicate over and over again. And, your employees will be excited you did.