Successful businesses recognise the importance of department communications and alignment as being highly critical to their development and growth. One if the biggest areas that any business must look at for serious growth, is the collaborative communications between all departments that have a customer touch point, in any shape or form.

1. 100% CONNECTED DEPARTMENTS = 100%
PRIORITY
WRITTEN BY JONATHAN HARTLEY
02/2016

2. DEPARTMENTAL COMMUNICATION
Successful businesses recognise the importance of department
communications and alignment as being highly critical to their
development and growth.
One if the biggest areas that any business must look at for serious growth,
is the collaborative communications between all departments that have a
customer touch point, in any shape or form.

3. DEPARTMENT SILOS? –
BREAK THEM DOWN... QUICKLY.
This requires strong transformational leadership and buy-in from the
employees and Senior Board. It has to be seen as joined up in its execution to
succeed.
To achieve a consistent understanding and clarity in a companies strategies, all
departments require constant development in their transparent
communications.
Breaking this down then into achievable activities for individuals and teams.

4. REGULAR INTER-DEPARTMENTAL MEETINGS
Which departments should be
communicating?
The answer is simply ALL should within your
business.
Every department plays it’s own part within
the end-to-end journey of your products or
services. It’s critical that all the departments
within a business know each others operation
and purpose.

5. THE OVERALL OBJECTIVE IF ANY BUSINESS IS
TO RETURN A PROFIT
 How best can departments convey their activities and support requirements?
 Each head of department attend respective monthly meetings, listen, engage, document and
communicate clearly and quickly through his or her own team's
 Ensure respective department heads chair meetings, communicating what it is their team are
responsible for. Discuss what input is required from other departments, by way of feedback or
support
 What works well, what could be better? A key part of any teams success us the
acknowledgement of feedback around what other departments feel works well, or doesn’t.
 It needs all department heads to takeaway ‘what could we do better to assist?’, not only our
colleagues, but also the customers, through a much better service

6. EXTERNAL & INTERNAL
SALES TEAM FEEDBACK
 What information is required?
 What is the feedback from the customer’s?
 What is the service and/or product feedback
from the sales team’s?
 Are channel heads requirements and
objectives clear to the team. It’s one thing for
a sales manager or director to request
activity, yet it’s entirely open to whether a
sales team has just listened, or actively
understood with 100% clarity.

7. IF THE STRATEGY IS POWERFUL,
YET THE CLARITY IS POOR, THEN
THE OUTCOME WILL ALSO BE POOR.
 The eyes and ears of sales teams is with their
customers. They are the front line and main
conduit for all their respective accounts, receiving
regular information on what works and what
doesn’t.
 If customers are not bought into the products,
promotions or overall service offered, then a
business needs to ‘tune in' quickly to what is
wanted over what is being sold.
 ‘Square pegs‘ do not go in round holes without
some adjustments and reshaping.

8. AREA'S OPEN FEEDBACK
SHOULD BE ACQUIRED &
DISCUSSED
 Promotional literature
 Is it working, if not, why not?
 Promotional campaigns
 Clarity, Ease, Relevance, ROI measures
 Products
 Quality, Ranges, Gaps, Price point
 Warranty, after sales
 Competition (S.W.O.T) Product Range Gap Analysis
 Customer Relationships with
 Accounts and Credit Team
 Senior management & Department Heads
 Level of external contact & support from internal teams
 Marketing
 Literature, POS, Incentives, is this what is required, is it used

9. WITHOUT
CUSTOMER'S
THERE IS NO
BUSINESS
 It is one step to do away with
internal silos, another to receive
quality feedback from all customer
touch points internally and
externally, but it is a far greater
achievement to actually use this
feedback effectively.

10. One of the biggest mistakes a business and its employees can make is to
actively seek and acquire valuable feedback, yet then not use it to strengthen
their overall service to their internal and external customers.
If customers take the time to provide 'gold dust' in terms of what they feel and
what they require, then to ignore this and carry on as before is commercial
suicide.
Customers will undoubtedly feel that information given has fallen on 'deaf ears'
and will be reluctant to offer any more in future.
They will take the view that no one listens, as will the customer teams that
work with them.

11.  A business cannot offer everything bespoke for a customer and tailor the
service or products to each request, what can be done is immensely important
to the retention and future development of customers and the relationships
that are forged with them.

12. FEEDBACK
 What are the Key areas that are being fed back?
 Where could adjustments or tweaks be made that would cost little, yet offer huge step
changes?
 What products could be discontinued to simplify and improve the offer?
 What changes can be made to promotions and incentives to increase uptake and engagement?
 What soft skills are lacking from departments with customers? Could these be improved?
 Reply to feedback, shout out what you've listened to and what you've done about it....
 These were customer's requests, you've listened to them, here is what we have done…
 What benefits have internal and external teams felt from the changes?
 How can these positive changes be incorporated in your new business development strategy?

13.  In summary if we are to show customers we care and we listen
then we should always ensure communications internally and
externally are free flowing and all barriers are removed.
 Actively seek feedback and listen
 Digest and Discuss
 Communicate and collaborate
 Update and Replicate
 Repeat monthly, maintain connected departments
 Don't build Silos