How do you do two-way communication?

Two-way communication is crucial for building trust among employees, aligning company goals, and sustaining productivity. But how can companies successfully incorporate this type of communication in a remote world? We get to the bottom of this.

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Your business runs on communication, that much is certain. Messages are shared between staff, employers, clients, and dozens of stakeholders around the clock. But communication doesn&#;t always equal dialogue.

In fact, much of corporate communication consists of one-way messages, designed to impart information. In the meantime, many companies overlook the importance of two-way communication in the workplace. We&#;ll explore why this can be detrimental to your business, and how to improve two-way communication while maximizing its benefits.

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What is Two-Way Communication?

Two-way communication is the process of sharing information back and forth between two parties. In other words, it&#;s a conversation where both the sender and receiver invite and offer feedback. And most importantly, two-way communication is never a monologue.

To maximize the benefits of two-way communication in the workplace, dialogue should be continuous. In other words, the flow of information between the sender and the receiver should be consistent. Effective internal communications tools, methods, and channels are vital in facilitating this process.

ContactMonkey&#;s interactive employee engagement software helps to facilitate dialogue in the workplace. It differs from other workplace digital communications tools because it doesn&#;t simply send out information. It encourages conversations through employee pulse surveys, anonymous comments, a range of interactive elements.

Types of Two-Way Communication

Two-way communication doesn&#;t always mean instantaneous face-to-face (or these days, screen-to-screen) conversations. It also doesn&#;t exclusively involve dialogue between managers and subordinates.The latest innovative internal communications tools let you transform traditional communication channels into two-way messaging tools.

Here are just some of the ways that two-way communications can manifest in the workplace:

• Horizontal two-way communication: communication between employees of the same rank is known as horizontal two-way communication.
• Vertical two-way communication: this type of two-way communication takes place between a superior and their employees.
• Asynchronous two-way communication: dialogue isn&#;t all about face-to-face conversation. Including a question or survey in your asynchronous communications is a great way to initiate dialogue.
• Instantaneous two-way communication: this can include things like texting staff VIA employee SMS internal communications. If you choose to go this route, select a high-performance employee text messaging system and make sure to follow SMS content best practices.

Check out our blog on the importance of internal communication and learn how to get team buy-in for effective digital employee communication tools.

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Why is Two-Way Communication Important?

Two-way communication is important because it builds trust and helps improve the free flow of ideas in the workplace.

Consider the process of organizational innovation. Contrary to what many imagine, it&#;s not all about CEOs spawning brilliant ideas and passing them along to staff.

Instead, it&#;s about employees from all levels of the company sharing insights, getting feedback, and going back to the drawing board.

The same goes for problem-solving. If employees and managers don&#;t welcome creative criticism and new ideas, it becomes difficult to introduce new ways of thinking and doing. As such, companies end up using age-old solutions to tackle new problems, and finding themselves at a dead end.

When it comes to building trust, two-way communication helps employees feel comfortable sharing feedback with colleagues and leaders. As employees see that their input is welcomed and valued, they begin to open up more. In turn, more honest and authentic conversations begin to take place, which strengthens workplace relationships.

Benefits of Two-Way Communication

The main advantages of two-way communication is in building trust and enhancing communication systems by improving idea-sharing. But these assets lead to a range of indirect benefits as well. Here are just a few of the top ones to keep in mind:

• Greater mutual understanding: continuous two-way communication prevents misunderstandings and one-directional thinking.
• Improved team alignment and collaboration: when employees are used to back-and-forth communication it becomes harder to create siloes. Collaboration also becomes natural. Use internal collaboration software to make this happen.
• Increased employee engagement: when remote employees are consistently involved in cross-organizational dialogue, it prevents isolation and disconnection.
• Greater job satisfaction: two-way communication offers an outlet for employee concerns, ideas, opinions, leading to heightened employee satisfaction.
• Increased job productivity: consistent dialogue leads to less ambiguity about tasks, projects, and responsibilities. As a result, there are less obstacles to workflow.
• Improved trust between employees: two-way communication helps employees feel more comfortable, leads to honest and authentic feedback, and nurtures trust towards leaders.

Understand the link between workplace engagement and business success with our breakdown of the latest employee engagement statistics.

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How to Encourage Two-Way Communication in the Workplace

Recognizing the benefits of two-way communication is important. But you may still be wondering &#;How do I actually implement this type of communication in the workplace?&#;

Don&#;t sweat it. Below, we cover some simple two-way communication best practices that you can easily incorporate into your internal messaging.

1. Picking the right communication channels

Two-way communication is only as effective as the channels and tools that you use to facilitate it. Take stock of your existing communication channels and identify the preferred methods of communication among employees.

Once you know what&#;s working, bolster your existing internal communication channels or implement new tools accordingly.

For instance, if employees are most vocal across Slack communities, start boosting two-way conversations through weekly surveys. If your newsletter garners a lot of engagement, use it to solicit more employee feedback, which can lead to new company newsletter ideas.

Pro tip: Use an interactive internal communications tool like ContactMonkey to improve two-way communication. ContactMonkey transforms static emails into dynamic conversations through comment boxes, videos, GIFs, and surveys in Outlook and Gmail.

Choosing which employee you communicate with is important for gathering the feedback you need. With ContactMonkey, you can create custom lists for different groups of employees with our List Management feature. ContactMonkey integrates with your Human Resources Information Systems (HRIS) like Workday and ADP, as well as Azure Active Directory, so your created lists will be automatically updated as employees join and leave your company.

7 ways to get genuine employee feedback in surveys

Will your people tell the truth? Here&#;s how to build trust.

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2. Creating a culture of employee feedback

To truly improve two-way communication, you&#;ll need to foster a culture of feedback in the workplace. After implementing the right feedback tools and channels, you should consistently gather employee input while encouraging upward feedback to managers.

Employee surveys and wellness check-ins should be conducted on a regular basis. In addition, leaders and managers should be encouraging feedback directly. This includes leaving time for Q&A during weekly stand ups and town halls.

Written leadership communications should also end with a question and offer more opportunities for feedback. For instance, you can add anonymous feedback boxes at the end of employee emails. This shows employees that their ideas and opinions are valued and encourages dialogue.

Use ContactMonkey&#;s pulse surveys to gather quick, continuous employee feedback. These types of employee surveys can be embedded directly into newsletters and their short, simple format encourages more participation.

3. Showing empathy and transparency

You wouldn&#;t want to open up to someone who you know to be judgmental and critical. Neither do your employees. That&#;s why showcasing empathy, authenticity, and transparency across your communications is a key way to encourage dialogue

So how do you visibly demonstrate these qualities? For starters, pull back on corporate jargon and using language that conveys coolness or indifference. Instead, use more plain, simple language across your internal communications.

You can even add humour by inserting animated GIFs in emails or including fun employee survey questions. Comedy is disarming and can make your employees feel more comfortable sharing and engaging in two-way communication.

Add GIFs and embed videos into internal communications using ContactMonkey&#;s HTML templates. Our responsive template builder allows you to incorporate a range of multimedia directly into your employee emails.

4. Always acting on employee feedback

Acting on employee feedback is one of the most durable ways to encourage two-way communication. It shows your employees the value of their feedback and provides an incentive to speak up more often.

Say you&#;ve sent your employees a Slack message asking them for ideas on incentivizing customers to leave more reviews. You&#;ve gathered some great suggestions and plan to implement them into your Customer Success workflow.

The next step is to recognize the value of employee feedback and share how you plan to use it. In your next employee newsletter, add a quick appreciation message to your team and highlight how you&#;ll be utilizing their recommendations.

Not only is this incredibly simple to do, but it will incentivize employees to share their input in the long run.

Improve employee engagement and boost two-way communication by implementing one of our 20+ employee recognition ideas.

Examples of Two-Way Communication

Two-way communication is crucial when it comes to getting employees to weigh in on company decisions and ways to improve employee experience. Let&#;s look at some two-way communication examples to see practical ways to implement it in your organization.

1. Interactive employee newsletters

Interactive emails promote two-way communication by encouraging employees to engage with a range of different media. Unlike static emails, interactive newsletters invite employees to rate content using stars and like buttons, respond with comments, and complete surveys.

With ContactMonkey&#;s interactive internal communications tool, users have access to all of these features alongside powerful internal analytics. You can gather employee feedback, along with engagement metrics all in your ContactMonkey dashboard.

Learn how to improve your employee communications with compelling internal communications storytelling.

By tracking engagement, you can use data to improve your two-way communication strategy.

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2. Employee pulse surveys and anonymous questionnaires

The short, focused nature of employee pulse surveys makes them easy to use on a frequent basis. By getting staff in the habit of sharing input and ideas, pulse surveys help make two-way communication feedback the norm across your organization.

Pulse surveys are normally positioned alongside other communications, like employee newsletters. This helps contextualize their topics.

For instance, if you want to find out whether employees are interested in more employee engagement opportunities, you can ask engagement questions next to an announcement about your upcoming virtual team building engagement games.

Anonymous feedback options also complement pulse surveys by giving employees the option to elaborate on their survey response:

Whether you&#;re conducting employee exit surveys, company culture questionnaires, or employee engagement surveys, ContactMonkeylets you embed feedback options across your internal emails. Your company newsletters turn into a two-way employee engagement channel through emoji reactions, thumbs up/down, and a range of survey options.

Want to make beautiful newsletters faster? Learn how to create an employee newsletter that stands out with our step-by-step guide. Or if you&#;re looking to create newsletter content quickly, try using our OpenAI ChatGPT integration. Leveraging AI tools for corporate communications is a great way to try out different formats, create first drafts, and get ideas for your newsletter that can then be tweaked and customized for your audience.

3. Virtual town halls

Virtual town halls are live stream events that bring together employees and leaders. It&#;s where managers provide key updates and employees have time to ask questions face-to-face. This makes virtual town halls a hub for two-way communication&#;if managed properly.

In addition to reserving time for Q&A sessions, you can conduct polls throughout your town hall to boost two-way communication. Employees can also be invited to give &#;shoutouts.&#; This gives staff an opportunity to recognize fellow colleagues and improves two-way horizontal communication.

You can maximize two-way communication during your next town hall by following our complete virtual town hall meeting guide. To ensure that your town hall runs smoothly, we also recommend using ContactMonkey&#;s event management tool. It allows you to create, promote, and manage your virtual events straight from your internal newsletter.

4. Employee wellness check-ins

Wellness check-ins enable managers to assess a number of factors that impact employee wellbeing and engagement in the workplace. But they also facilitate two-way communication and encourage employers and managers to build trust.

Staff gain an outlet for sharing any challenges that they&#;re experiencing. They can also suggest resources that your company can provide to help.

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Wellness check-ins can be done in-person during your weekly meetings with staff. They can also take on the form of two-way communication campaigns. In the latter example, employee wellness surveys are sent out to employees in their newsletter.

Our guide on employee wellness surveys helps you learn how to lead successful employee wellness check-ins. It also shows you how to use them to promote two-way communication.

5. Employee Net Promoter Score (eNPS)

eNPS surveys are designed to check employee engagement levels across your organization. They do this by measuring the likelihood of your employees recommending your business to others as a place to work.

What makes them an effective two-way communication tool is their ability to tackle two priorities at once. While measuring employee engagement, eNPS surveys also invite employees to give feedback consistently through their simple, straightford structure:

With ContactMonkey, you can track the results of your eNPS survey in your analytics dashboard. If you notice glaring issues with employee engagement, you can reach out to employees directly, asking for further feedback. In this way, eNPS surveys help promote continuous two-way communication.

Learn how to build a business case for internal communications campaigns, tools, and initiatives with our step-by-step guide.

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Use Two-Way Communication to Drive Productivity

Two-way communication ensures that information moves in all directions across your organization. This maximizes collaboration and idea-sharing, promotes innovation, and boosts trust in leadership. But to get the most out of two-way communication you need to have tools designed to promote dialogue.

Learn how to use an internal communications software to improve employee dialogue at your organization. Track your improvements over time to demonstrate the real benefit of your internal communications.

ContactMonkey doesn&#;t simply send out information. It helps you engage employees in conversation through interactive emails and embedded pulse surveys. Book your free demo to see ContactMonkey in action.

July 1,

Communication is at the core of every human function. Without it, workers can&#;t know what&#;s expected of them, how to achieve their goals, or where to find support. A crucial part of effective communication is reciprocity &#; when communication becomes a two-way street, it allows each individual to participate freely and meaningfully. 

&#;Nobody likes working at a company that doesn't take their viewpoint into account, that doesn't recognise the value of their voice,&#; said Julia Markish, director of advisory services at Lattice. &#;The act of asking, listening, and acting on employee voices will naturally help have an engaged workforce.&#; 

Building a two-way communication strategy can leverage the otherwise untapped insights of employees, and help them feel more connected to each other, to leaders and to the company as a whole.

What is Two-Way Communication? 

Two-way communication is an intentional style of interaction between two or more parties, where all participants are encouraged to share information and ideas, and especially to listen to what each other has contributed.

&#;There is always the risk of your message not landing with your audience,&#; Markish said. &#;Unless you engage in active listening back, you'll never actually know whether the message that landed was the message that you intended.&#;

Why it matters: Expecting and receiving timely communication builds trust, accountability, and respect among employees and managers. Two-way communication helps employees know they can count on meaningful responses, their ideas are being taken seriously, and they&#;re genuinely part of the team  &#; instead of a cog in the corporate machine.

Benefits of Two-Way Communication

Two-way communication is critical to the success of each and every business strategy, and largely benefits employees at all levels. 

• Improved performance. The better a company communicates, the easier it is to reach objectives and key results. While poor communication causes teams to guess the next step, great communication ensures everyone is on the same page, even as conditions and priorities shift. This helps everyone perform better at a quicker pace, increasing the productivity and performance of an organisation as a whole.
• Stronger teams. Developing authentic, meaningful relationships with colleagues can help them feel more connected and accountable to each other and to their shared goals. When employees feel comfortable and encouraged to have ongoing communication with their leaders and each other, it&#;s easier for them to ask for help and solve problems together.
• Better ideas. When employees are encouraged to collaborate instead of working in silos, their shared brainstorms can increase the quality of innovative ideas, and reduce the chance of redundancy. Individual efforts are often not enough to keep up with today&#;s complex business landscape. Bouncing ideas off colleagues is one of the best ways to innovate and share perspectives.

Ultimately, two-way communication creates an environment where employees feel confident to bring ideas to the table, ask questions, and identify areas for improvement without fear of retribution. 

Organisational cultures built on reciprocity and engagement are more likely to retain employees, because they&#;ll build a sense of purpose and belonging when connecting with colleagues. Some companies take things even further by making self-peer-manager feedback as part of their approach to performance. Even if your company isn't ready for that, two-way communication at the cultural level is still a must.

10 Simple Strategies for Encouraging Two-Way Communication

1. Invest in tools that make communication easy. 

Employees should have equal and direct access to communicating with each other synchronously and asynchronously. While some employees might have an easy time sharing their ideas and opinions in a public forum, other introverted workers might not have the same confidence. 

&#;Engagement surveys are going to be your best bet,&#; Markish said. But to work effectively, surveys should function as part of your larger communication approach, not a standalone tactic, she added.&#;If your only vehicle for soliciting concerns from employees is five minutes at the end of an All-Hands where you read through a sanitised list of questions, then that's not two-way communication. That's performative. Look around at your systems and processes to identify whether they all have a component of that two way communication.&#;

Inter-office communication &#; like instant messaging or employee feedback tools that let workers and managers share feedback easily &#; make it easier to share information in hybrid workplaces where employees have to communicate remotely or across time zones. The simpler it is for employees to share their opinions, the more often they&#;ll let their thoughts be known.

2. Have company executives lead by example.

When individual contributors see that leaders have bought into and spent time engaging with feedback from employees, they may feel more inclined to participate than if the guidance came solely from Human Resources management. Markish emphasised that HR teams need support and alignment from executives to make two-way communication an ingrained part of company culture.

&#;HR teams need to take the role of loudspeaker, not content creator,&#; Markish said. &#;Communication expectations are operational. They need to be coming directly from leaders or chiefs of staff.&#;

One way to bring leaders into the fold is through focus groups or training sessions. Training leaders to model and endorse the values of two-way communication will help employees across the organisation see it, value it, and understand how to implement it themselves.

3. Use meetings effectively, not redundantly. 

Recurring meetings, forgotten agendas, and missing stakeholders create a recipe for hybrid disaster. When employees have to attend meetings just for the sake of it, they become disengaged and resentful of collaboration. 

Sustainable manufacturing company Trane Technologies found a way to reduce meaningless meetings with a strategy of cutting right to the chase. They implemented check-ins called &#;What Matters Most?&#; between managers and employees, which involved &#;having one on one conversations, really getting to know your team, and understanding what they value,&#; said Teodora Vassileva, a regional learning and development leader at the company. 

Vassileva&#;s team created an automated survey where employees identify three things that matter most, and send responses to their manager. Managers are then required to meet with the employee within 30 days to discuss employees&#; responses. 

&#;When managers see the [employee&#;s response], they might assume &#;she really wants work life balance &#; she must not be getting it&#;,&#; Vassileva explained. &#;But really she means that it's great. Like, &#;I get to work from home and you allow me to do that. That's very, very important to me right now&#;.&#; 

Following a survey with a meeting for listening is just one example of effectively closing the loop. Managers can also support effective communication by using one-to-ones to review feedback instead of running through tasks, or encouraging employees to meet with colleagues on other teams. 

4. Recognise and reward employee contributions.

Feeling overworked and underappreciated was the leading pain point when we surveyed UK employees in &#; 44% of them said it was the top reason they considered switching jobs. But in that same survey, only 19% of HR leaders thought it was a reason employees were quitting. This disconnect between both groups could be more deeply understood with effective communication.

More than twice as many respondents said they'd consider leaving a job due to feeling overworked and under-appreciated, rather than better compensation.

&#;Uplifting our people, culture, and communities&#; is one of the values that drives Vassileva&#;s team. &#;Absolutely everything we do is tied to that,&#; she added, and encouraged People teams and managers to think about what that looks like at a macro and micro level.

HR teams, executives, and managers can all pitch in for employee recognition. Make positive feedback celebratory by publicly sharing wins during meetings, on instant messaging, or through department-wide emails. Offering praise regularly helps employees know they&#;re doing a good job individually, and that they&#;re on the right track to make an impact for the team.  

5. Make your office space more accessible.

In hybrid environments, it&#;s crucial to ensure remote employees have the same access to meetings and collaboration as everyone else. That means making video or conferencing available to every meeting attendee, regardless of their location, so they can participate in group conversations synchronously.  

For meetings delivered over video or audio, enabling captions, transcripts and recordings can help employees see, hear and process the communication in the way that is most accessible to their needs, and be able to reference information later if they&#;re unable to take notes.  

For companies returning to in-person workplaces, leaders should think about the design of the physical spaces so employees can interact and connect with each other easily, while still having space and time to focus on their work. 

Keeping office doors open or having virtual office hours held regularly makes leaders more accessible to individuals who want direct access to share their thoughts and ideas.

6. Launch a mentorship program.

Support employee development with the resources you already have by pairing new and seasoned employees together to foster mentorships within the workplace. When employees are encouraged to connect with colleagues outside of their functional teams, they share institutional knowledge they might never have accessed otherwise. 

HR teams can provide guidance for mentors and mentees to contribute to the relationship, such as setting a cadence for meetings and structuring feedback to promote exchange of ideas. 

Employees can use what they learn from each other to work on their professional growth and solve departmental challenges, both of which benefit development, performance and learning across the organisation. Managers can even have employees include insights from their mentors in developmental reviews or conversations about career tracks.

7. Establish communication norms in your onboarding process.

Employees spend the first few weeks of a new role trying to absorb a fountain of company information, yet it can feel more like trying to drink water from a firehose. Clearly explaining communication norms from the onset of their employee experience can help workers understand what to expect from their new company culture. 

&#;The way we communicate has to be born of your operating rhythm, style, and team,&#; Markish said. &#;It probably will fall flat otherwise.&#;

If your company has specific communication norms &#; such as a day of the reserved for no meetings, or a time frame for expecting responses to instant messages &#; make it clear that everyone is expected to observe them. Don&#;t forget to document your norms in a central, accessible place that employees can regularly reference, such as a company-wide intranet or your HRIS. 

8. Schedule team-building events regularly.

When employees feel connected to the rest of their team, they&#;ll be more comfortable sharing their ideas candidly. Having dedicated time for building relationships at work can help employees become more connected to, accountable to, and supportive of each other. 

Scheduling events once a quarter (or even more frequently) will give employees a chance to mingle with colleagues in a more casual setting. 

Team-building doesn&#;t have to be team-specific, though. Especially in remote environments, not everyone regularly interacts with individuals who work in different departments. Regularly making time for lunch, coffee chats, or other short meetings can improve cross-functional collaboration, connectivity, and feedback. 

9. Look for dips in employee feedback. 

When tracking employee satisfaction and experience through engagement surveys, Vassileva said signs of disengagement can be found in the volume of responses &#; not just the contents of responses themselves.

&#;When we don't get a lot of feedback or reception, that's a very big indicator that engagement isn't happening,&#; she said. 

If participation or adoption rates fall unexpectedly, that&#;s a form of communication in itself. Taking time to speak with employees &#; such as the &#;What Matters Most?&#; conversations or focus groups &#; can help managers keep a pulse on why employees attitudes are changing. Perhaps they don&#;t have time to participate in engagement surveys, which is an indicator of being overworked. Or they don&#;t believe the survey results will lead to productive changes, which means they&#;re sceptical of HR and leadership. Either way, it&#;s worth finding out what&#;s underneath the lack of responses. 

10. Align feedback methods with employee needs.

Make sure the efforts put in to employee feedback and recognition are aligned with the way employees want to be praised &#; otherwise, recognition programs become a misguided effort. 

In a survey of workers by Blackhawk Network, 75% of respondents whose employers deliver recognition and rewards programmes said they don&#;t actually recognise people the way they&#;d prefer. Over half of respondents wanted to be publicly recognised alongside colleagues, while 48% wanted to be privately recognised by their manager. Ultimately, 83% of respondents said receiving recognition would increase their productivity and loyalty to their company.

It&#;s easy to look at other companies making headlines for innovative people strategies, but external benchmarking can be distracting and irrelevant to what your company can reasonably and effectively achieve. Conducting a survey about current communication norms and needs is the perfect place to start.

&#;You can gather inspiration externally, but the people that you are accountable to are your employees, not anybody outside of the organisation,&#; Markish said.  &#;If you're able to hold up a mirror and really get specific, that can help your company get aligned on a lot of processes.&#;

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Lattice helps businesses reshape their people management strategies to make work more meaningful. To learn more about making the most out of employee engagement, download our eBook, How to Use Real-Time Engagement to Build a Winning Culture. 

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