Why Poor Internal Communication is a Symptom of something Worse

Any growing church or organization is going to experience pain along the way. Contrary to popular belief pain is not always a bad thing. It can be an indicator that something needs to change. Internal streamlined communication is one of the most common pain points that churches and organizations experience as they grow. The intriguing thing is that communication is rarely the real problem. It’s usually a symptom that the church or organization has outgrown its systems, structures and its time to change, or there is an unhealthy team culture.

#1 Cascading Communication
When information doesn’t cascade quickly and easily throughout the organization allowing the team members to quickly align and make decisions at the appropriate pace to respond to issues as they come up, there’s a communication problem.

#2 Lines of Communication
Too many lines of communication complicate things and complexity that isn’t married to efficiency slows things down.

#3 Information as Power
When information is used as power to hoard instead of to share decision-making slows down and the organization is robbed of the best thinking and solutions.

#4 Silos
When communication becomes territorial and team members don’t share information between departments you know you’ve got a problem that’s bigger than communication. 

#5 Who Makes What Decision?
When team members are confused as to whom they should go to for what decision communication is a symptom of a structural or system problem.

#6 Less Chance of a Veto
When information isn’t communicated up and team members would rather ask for forgiveness instead of permission, communication is an indicator that there is a cultural issue that needs to be addressed.

#7 End-around
When team members go around other team members, especially their supervisor this is another classic sign that unhealthy communication patterns are often a sing of an unhealthy team culture.